What do you think?
Watermelon Pool
A glorious celebration of imagination and summertime in this Korean bestselling picture book, now available in English
When the summer sun is in full force, there’s only one way to beat the dive into a watermelon pool. After a large watermelon gets split in half, everyone in the village dives in, digging into the fruit and making slides from the rind while spending a joy-filled day together until nightfall.
Bonsoir Lune is a bestselling and beloved picture book creator working in Korea. Watermelon Pool was her debut picture book, first published in 2015. Translated by New York Times bestselling author Fraces Cha, Watermelon Pool is the perfect, refreshing read during any scorching hot summer.
When the summer sun is in full force, there’s only one way to beat the dive into a watermelon pool. After a large watermelon gets split in half, everyone in the village dives in, digging into the fruit and making slides from the rind while spending a joy-filled day together until nightfall.
Bonsoir Lune is a bestselling and beloved picture book creator working in Korea. Watermelon Pool was her debut picture book, first published in 2015. Translated by New York Times bestselling author Fraces Cha, Watermelon Pool is the perfect, refreshing read during any scorching hot summer.
Kindle Edition
Published June 2, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 63 reviews
July 10, 2026
uhm this is the cutest thing ever
can I live here
can I live here
August 13, 2026
A delightfully imaginative picture book about a town of small people who gather to swim on the opening of their community's pool, a giant watermelon that has split in half. Children race to jump in to play and their frolicking eventually creates the pool to swim in. A grandfather carves out a slice of the rind to create a slide for the children to use between the two watermelon halves. Everyone has a great time and they continue playing until it's time to go home. Then at the very end of the story, we see a giant spoon eating the watermelon. An originally refreshing story perfect to read on a hot summer afternoon by the pool with a cold slice of watermelon.
July 6, 2026
A visual and imaginative delight of a picture book.
July 25, 2026
Great idea, creepy execution. However, I liked the bright colors.
June 10, 2026
That's got to be the stickiest pool ever!
July 1, 2026
非常可爱的脑洞，我也好想在西瓜里游泳啊。适合夏天的一本书。
June 30, 2026
I just finished reading Make Believe: On Telling Stories to Children by Mac Barnett. It was in the news quite a bit and I figured it would probably behoove me to read the book in its entirety to see what was what. Originally published for an Italian readership (and subsequently picked up by other Western and Eastern European nations) the book offers a critique of contemporary American children’s book publishing. Considering the intended readership at the book’s start, this makes quite a bit of sense. American books have always been considered by Europe to be stuffy, moralistic, and to proselytize (we don’t even like to include boobs!). Mind you, one glance at Rainbow Fish (a Belgian spawn) and you can toss the whole American-books-are-the-only-didactic-ones idea right out the window. Neglected in this discussion, though, is the Asian book market. Books from Japan, China, Korea, Taiwan, and other nearby nations are far more likely to reach Barnett’s platonic ideal of fictional picture book perfection. Though they rate no mention in Make Believe (Barnett, while well-versed in the past, has not an equal footing in the contemporary children’s book scene), these countries are (in additional to a great many American creators) producing inventive, incredible, and innovative works. Suzy Lee! Heena Baek! To say nothing of the work of Taro Gomi, Shinsuke Yoshitake, Guojing, Akiko Miyakoshi, and countless others. Add Bonsoir Lune to that list, by the way. Not that she’s a new creator or anything. Back in 2015, she published a book in Korea called Watermelon Pool. Now, at a sloth-like pace, it has crawled its way to our American shores and bookstores. Utterly silly, kid-friendly, and downright delightful, it is precisely the kind of title to restore anyone’s faith in the state of modern picture book publishing today.
A single watermelon ripens under a blazing hot sun. All at once a crack appears, and the next thing you know it has deepened so much that the watermelon has fallen entirely into two separate pieces. “It’s opening day at the watermelon pool,” the text reads, and the first person there is an old man in a sun hat, who carefully leans his ladder against its side while remarking, “Hmm, looks like no one’s here yet.” After removing a large seed, he sinks down into the space it made commenting, “Mmm, nice and cool.” His placid solitude doesn’t last for long, though. Soon children and adults, young and old, clamber up the ladder, stalks, and leaves, to take advantage of the pool’s opening. A full day ensues of slides, stomps, and a bit of sinking into the cool watermelon flesh. And when at last the day is done, the pool is closed for the season. Just waiting until summer comes again.
In many ways, Watermelon Pool falls neatly into the category of picture books that fulfill children’s deepest fantasies of diving into enormous piles of food in some way. Consider Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs or The Giant Jam Sandwich or (a personal favorite) Who Made This Cake?. There’s some innate human desire in all of us to subsume ourselves in the edible. And one of the things I liked best about Watermelon Pool specifically was its logistics in this matter. One does not simply dive into a watermelon, after all. Its flesh may be permeable, but it's not fully liquid. Lune acknowledges this fact so that even when characters do dive in (feet first) there is this satisfying “PLOP!” that occurs when they pierce but do not sink. In many ways, the watermelon comes across as a kind of kiddie pool. And thanks to its own internal logic, we never bother to wonder about the logistics of where it came from and what it truly is. Admit it. On a hot summer’s day, would you worry about such things either?
So much of the book’s charm, though, lies in its internal logic. With very little effort, Lune has managed to think through the logistics of what a world filled with an annual watermelon pool might encompass. Two older folks walking down the road mention that the “coconut pool” in the next town is already open, so logically the watermelon pool must be opening soon. They kvetch, as old people are wont to do, about previous years when there were problems like too many seeds (followed by a silent two-page spread of some poor schmuck floundering amidst a sea of seeds). When the children get to the watermelon itself, they proceed to stomp their feet, and the text reads, “Everyone stomps together and the clear, crimson watermelon juice starts to pool.” Occasionally an adult will even carve a slide out of the outer rind from one half of the watermelon to the other. Somewhere amidst the images of kids patting watermelon flesh into snowman shapes you just have to stop and admire the creator’s imagination. Maybe she didn’t think of absolutely everything one can do with a giant watermelon, but she at least came pretty darn close.
Naturally, this brings us to the art itself. The publication page is nicely coherent about what exactly is going on here. It says, “The illustrator of this book created the art with colored pencil and drawing paper.” I think a lot about things that illustrator Shawn Harris has said over the years about illustrating books in mediums that kids themselves can use. Children have access to colored pencils sometimes, and to see Lune really going to town with them here is impressive. Admittedly, I can’t immediately imagine any kid looking at this book and realizing that they too might someday create art of their own with similar tools. Then again, it is easy for adults to underestimate kids. And this book has the potential to linger in the minds of its young readers for many decades to come.
Why would it take eleven years for this picture book charmer to finally arrive on American shores? Who’s to say? One thing I will point out, though, is that if you are looking for great summer books for your Fourth of July displays (and I’m looking at you, children’s librarians and bookstore workers) this title is a brilliant and obvious inclusion. It has a droll little attitude towards the illogically logical nature of its world. Charm is that ephemeral quality sometimes found in picture books, but impossible to teach. This book has an abundance of the stuff. Sweet, strange, and maybe the teensiest bit delicious, it defies categorization, managing to straddle that line between high quality literature/art and kid-friendliness. A book not to miss. A beauty to its core.
A single watermelon ripens under a blazing hot sun. All at once a crack appears, and the next thing you know it has deepened so much that the watermelon has fallen entirely into two separate pieces. “It’s opening day at the watermelon pool,” the text reads, and the first person there is an old man in a sun hat, who carefully leans his ladder against its side while remarking, “Hmm, looks like no one’s here yet.” After removing a large seed, he sinks down into the space it made commenting, “Mmm, nice and cool.” His placid solitude doesn’t last for long, though. Soon children and adults, young and old, clamber up the ladder, stalks, and leaves, to take advantage of the pool’s opening. A full day ensues of slides, stomps, and a bit of sinking into the cool watermelon flesh. And when at last the day is done, the pool is closed for the season. Just waiting until summer comes again.
In many ways, Watermelon Pool falls neatly into the category of picture books that fulfill children’s deepest fantasies of diving into enormous piles of food in some way. Consider Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs or The Giant Jam Sandwich or (a personal favorite) Who Made This Cake?. There’s some innate human desire in all of us to subsume ourselves in the edible. And one of the things I liked best about Watermelon Pool specifically was its logistics in this matter. One does not simply dive into a watermelon, after all. Its flesh may be permeable, but it's not fully liquid. Lune acknowledges this fact so that even when characters do dive in (feet first) there is this satisfying “PLOP!” that occurs when they pierce but do not sink. In many ways, the watermelon comes across as a kind of kiddie pool. And thanks to its own internal logic, we never bother to wonder about the logistics of where it came from and what it truly is. Admit it. On a hot summer’s day, would you worry about such things either?
So much of the book’s charm, though, lies in its internal logic. With very little effort, Lune has managed to think through the logistics of what a world filled with an annual watermelon pool might encompass. Two older folks walking down the road mention that the “coconut pool” in the next town is already open, so logically the watermelon pool must be opening soon. They kvetch, as old people are wont to do, about previous years when there were problems like too many seeds (followed by a silent two-page spread of some poor schmuck floundering amidst a sea of seeds). When the children get to the watermelon itself, they proceed to stomp their feet, and the text reads, “Everyone stomps together and the clear, crimson watermelon juice starts to pool.” Occasionally an adult will even carve a slide out of the outer rind from one half of the watermelon to the other. Somewhere amidst the images of kids patting watermelon flesh into snowman shapes you just have to stop and admire the creator’s imagination. Maybe she didn’t think of absolutely everything one can do with a giant watermelon, but she at least came pretty darn close.
Naturally, this brings us to the art itself. The publication page is nicely coherent about what exactly is going on here. It says, “The illustrator of this book created the art with colored pencil and drawing paper.” I think a lot about things that illustrator Shawn Harris has said over the years about illustrating books in mediums that kids themselves can use. Children have access to colored pencils sometimes, and to see Lune really going to town with them here is impressive. Admittedly, I can’t immediately imagine any kid looking at this book and realizing that they too might someday create art of their own with similar tools. Then again, it is easy for adults to underestimate kids. And this book has the potential to linger in the minds of its young readers for many decades to come.
Why would it take eleven years for this picture book charmer to finally arrive on American shores? Who’s to say? One thing I will point out, though, is that if you are looking for great summer books for your Fourth of July displays (and I’m looking at you, children’s librarians and bookstore workers) this title is a brilliant and obvious inclusion. It has a droll little attitude towards the illogically logical nature of its world. Charm is that ephemeral quality sometimes found in picture books, but impossible to teach. This book has an abundance of the stuff. Sweet, strange, and maybe the teensiest bit delicious, it defies categorization, managing to straddle that line between high quality literature/art and kid-friendliness. A book not to miss. A beauty to its core.
June 17, 2026
Spring 2026: I ordered this to use for the last week of school and someone stole it from my mailroom and yes I am still annoyed.
.
That said, it’s just as adorably fun and cute AND GORGEOUS (the art!!!!) as promised (another Colby Sharp recommendation) and maybe it’ll be my first Library readaloud next Fall!
Fall 2026: I’ve read, and re-read, this book out loud to students 12 times so far this week, with about 8 more times to go. I love it even if I had to buy it twice (SOMEONE STOLE THE FIRST ONE).
.
That said, it’s just as adorably fun and cute AND GORGEOUS (the art!!!!) as promised (another Colby Sharp recommendation) and maybe it’ll be my first Library readaloud next Fall!
Fall 2026: I’ve read, and re-read, this book out loud to students 12 times so far this week, with about 8 more times to go. I love it even if I had to buy it twice (SOMEONE STOLE THE FIRST ONE).
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Summer is fast approaching and this creative picture book is a perfect choice to add to a young reader's bookshelf to think about cooling off this summer.
Young readers can read along to imagine what it would be like to jump into a cool pool made from a summertime favorite watermelon. Each colorful and creatively presented illustration depicts all of the fun that diving into a waermelon pool can bring to the summer. The watermelon pool brings everyone in the community together for a delightfully refreshing swim in this wonderful pool. The pool party is a great way to celebrate the summer for the people in this community.
Watermelon Pool is an award-winning and bestselling picture book in Korea. It has now been translated into English for young readers everywhere to enjoy and to imagine what summer could be like if everyone could have a watermelon pool.
Be sure to bring slices of watermelon for your young reader to enjoy after reading.
This delightful picture book will be on sale in your favorite bookstore on June 2, 2026. It has an ISBN of 979-8-217-11178-7.
Young readers can read along to imagine what it would be like to jump into a cool pool made from a summertime favorite watermelon. Each colorful and creatively presented illustration depicts all of the fun that diving into a waermelon pool can bring to the summer. The watermelon pool brings everyone in the community together for a delightfully refreshing swim in this wonderful pool. The pool party is a great way to celebrate the summer for the people in this community.
Watermelon Pool is an award-winning and bestselling picture book in Korea. It has now been translated into English for young readers everywhere to enjoy and to imagine what summer could be like if everyone could have a watermelon pool.
Be sure to bring slices of watermelon for your young reader to enjoy after reading.
This delightful picture book will be on sale in your favorite bookstore on June 2, 2026. It has an ISBN of 979-8-217-11178-7.
August 30, 2026
This gem was published in Korea in 2015 and has now appeared in English. Like all of the best picture books for inquiring young minds, this is a fantasy world filled with tiny people who celebrate summer by swimming in a watermelon pool. And who wouldn't want to do that? I wish I could join them. They wait for a a huge watermelon to crack open {in two perfect halves} and then all come running to join in the fun. They grow their own tiny melons, but there are also giant sized watermelons for swimming. They start by removing the seeds and sitting in the holes left behind, then stomp on the flesh until juice appears and enjoy that too. Grandpa cuts a slice out of the side for a slide and they carve melon people and enjoy the pool until dark. At the end, spoons appear and the melon is eaten by some unseen, presumably larger people. This is just pure imaginative fun and I would like to see more books by "Bonsoir Lune." This translates to "Goodnight Moon," perhaps a tip of the hat to the classic picture book?
June 30, 2026
Grand kid appeal in this Korean import, it appears it is his first translated work into English; let's hope we see more. A watermelon splits in half under the summer heat leaving a perfect "pool" for kids and oldsters alike to spend a silly afternoon basking in the pink. How does one slip into a watermelon pool? Well, granddad removes a pit and slides into the just-right pocket left by the pit's indentation. Other ingenious "swimmers" build a water slide from one half of the watermelon into the other out of a slice of rind. It's just one day, ending with a lovely gentle sunset, but it's meditative in a kid-friendly fun format of silliness. Lune's palette is the most glorious shade of perfection in watermelon pink contrast with bold bright emerald green.
August 12, 2026
I follow a children's book author and editor who reviewed this darling picture book and I was intrigued. Then it appeared for review in the Wall Street Journal. I was convinced to check it out from our local library even without a child to read it to. It is delightful! I agree with Betsy Bird, a great many American children's books are rather didactic and lack whimsy for whimsy's sake. I'm not sure why it took from 2016 to 2026 for this gem to be translated from Korean to English, but I'm so glad it was!
August 14, 2026
Yum Yum watermelon!
This title brings so many memories to mind of summer days among the watermelons and this Korean author/illustrator has captured the very texture of the flesh of watermelon in her illustrations with colored pencils. A great summer story and imaginative comparison that it is a pool as it is a pool of juicy fruit. How imaginative to see a slice of the rind used as a slide.
This translation was first published in South Korea in 2015 and in the USA in 2026
Than you Penguin Random House for the sweet juicy memories of my watermelon days! I am buying this title!
This title brings so many memories to mind of summer days among the watermelons and this Korean author/illustrator has captured the very texture of the flesh of watermelon in her illustrations with colored pencils. A great summer story and imaginative comparison that it is a pool as it is a pool of juicy fruit. How imaginative to see a slice of the rind used as a slide.
This translation was first published in South Korea in 2015 and in the USA in 2026
Than you Penguin Random House for the sweet juicy memories of my watermelon days! I am buying this title!
June 30, 2026
ST Watermelon or fruit. A giant watermelon becomes a swimming pool for a community. I went abck and forth between thinking it was gross and thinking it sounded fun. Sticky watermelon juice all over...? The images a re abit detailed for a a small ST but I think kids will really love this one. Such a fun idea for kids to think about.
July 21, 2026
5 stars. Whimsical and quirky at the same time! Who would think to go swimming in a giant split in half watermelon? What fun on a hot summer day. I keep telling my logical brain to just go with it. Logical brain says the watermelon flesh is bound to be warm and juice sticky. The end pages are green, the page edges bright pink - opening the book pages is like diving right into the watermelon!
July 26, 2026
Of course a watermelon pool sounds awesome in the middle of summer and that's just what they'll all enjoy. Dive right in and swim around. You can start with popping out one seed to make a little trough and then go from there. Everyone can enjoy young and old.
The kind of summertime read that is creative and inspires a snack or STEAM.
The kind of summertime read that is creative and inspires a snack or STEAM.
August 12, 2026
What a wild book! The perfect, almost childlike illustrations by Frances Cha in colored pencil show the fantastic summer ritual of a community enjoying swimming in a giant, halved watermelon. The enormous melon is host to the entire community where all the rites of the beach are carried out before the sun sets and the melon swimming season is closed. Delightful.
September 7, 2026
This was originally published in Korean in 2015. Traslated by Frances Cha 2026. May also be Caldecott eligible as the illustrator "divides her time between New York and South Korea"
I liked it but just a little too much for me. However, I can see teachers and librarians liking it for story times and watermelon tastings.
I liked it but just a little too much for me. However, I can see teachers and librarians liking it for story times and watermelon tastings.
September 17, 2026
I enjoyed reading this book with my mom, it doesn't have many words so I was able to read all the words out loud by myself. The special part of this book is the beautiful illustrations, I couldn't believe it was all drawn by hand with colored pencils! A watermelon pool is such a fun idea, I wish I could swim in one too!
June 11, 2026
I'm so glad this was translated into English, because it is such a treasure. Totally imaginative and original, yet surprisingly accessible and sweet. Basically, a watermelon becomes the community pool for a season. A rind sliver is broken off for a slide. Shenanigans and sunbathing ensue.
July 14, 2026
I can't remember now who suggested this to me. It was too weird for me. However, as I think of Caldecott criteria, it would probably be a contender. I'm curious how my students would react to this as a read-aloud.
July 20, 2026
Delightful. A surreal summer fantasy of watermelon pool perfection. Small/detailed illustrations warrant small-group reading ideally.
Themes: Swimming, Watermelon, Summer
Age range: Toddler-Early Elementary
Themes: Swimming, Watermelon, Summer
Age range: Toddler-Early Elementary
July 22, 2026
Genuinely curious if little me would have loved this story or never wanted to eat a watermelon again.
Fun, imaginative book with sweet illustrations. Definitely requires an imagination and a fun one at that!
Fun, imaginative book with sweet illustrations. Definitely requires an imagination and a fun one at that!
August 7, 2026
A wonderfully silly story of a watermelon that becomes a swimming pool, with a slide! Characters of all ages enjoy the cool, refreshingness of the juice as many feet stomp the pulp.
A fabulous book for storytime. Pair with Pizzoli's The Watermelon Seed.
A fabulous book for storytime. Pair with Pizzoli's The Watermelon Seed.
September 9, 2026
Delightful summertime read by South Korean author Bonsoir Lune, whose name means "Goodnight Moon" in French. Art is colored pencil on drawing paper, which makes the pictures seem a little bit childlike even though they are meticulously drawn. I hope there's a sequel called Coconut Pool.
Review of advance copy received from Edelweiss+
Fun and imaginative.
June 9, 2026
Delightfully whimsical and absurd
June 9, 2026
This is fairly bizarre. Or imaginative. Whichever you prefer to call it!
June 10, 2026
Whimsical and with no plot whatsoever. Kind of like a summer inspired fever dream.
The illustrations are cute.
The illustrations are cute.
June 19, 2026
A book about the short and sweet kiss of summer.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 63 reviews