One, Some, Many

Steve Pitt is a Toronto-based freelance writer and an award-winning journalist. He has written many young adult and children's books, including Day of the Flying Fox: The True Story of World War II Pilot Charley Fox.

What could your child’s playpen and the New York Museum of Modern Art
have in common? Bright, bold works of art by Tom Slaughter.
Slaughter’s first children’s book, 1, 2, 3, uses cut-paper designs
inspired by Fauvist painter Henri Matisse to teach young readers how to
count from one to 10. Fauvism rejects three-dimensional art and relies
instead on exuberant colours and shapes to convey space and movement. In
this book, each eye-popping panel also features a different shape,
ranging from beach balls to wildflowers to sailboats.

In One Some Many, Slaughter teams up with his wife, veteran author
Marthe Jocelyn (Hannah and the Seven Dresses, Hannah’s Collections),
to introduce young children (from preschool to kindergarten) to the more
abstract themes of inexact numbers. As in 1, 2, 3, each page features
dazzling, highly original cut-paper illustrations that introduce the
reader to modern art as well as to basic mathematical concepts. Highly
recommended.