Big and Small, Room for All.

Description

32 pages
$20.99
ISBN 978-0-88776-891-0
DDC j153.7'52

Publisher

Tundra Books

Year

2009

Contributor

Illustrations by Gillian Newland
Reviewed by Aileen Wortley

Review

The magnificent illustration and simple, poetic text give this beautiful concept book a vastness beyond its subject matter of size and scale.

Fourteen bold, double-page spreads, combined with a few simple descriptive words, give a sense of grandeur to every scene. Children learn that size is relative when they see, for instance, in one picture how small the sun is compared to the sky but how huge it appears on the next page when compared with the Earth. Similarly, a toddler is small beside his father but big compared with his kitten. The reader is taken on a journey through the illimitable universe and back to tiny things such as mice, fleas, and those too small to be seen by the naked eye.

Jo Ellen Bogart is a prolific award-winning author of the Ruth Schwartz Award who has also been short-listed for the Mr. Christie’s Book Award. In this title, using minimal words, she allows children to see that the world is amazing and that everything; including themselves, has their own niche in the cosmos.

Gillian Newland has a diploma in illustration from Sheridan College. This is her first book. The watercolour washes are presented in rich, warm earth tones but with bold splashes of bright colour, such as the lovely orange cat and the vibrant stripes on a sweater. All the pictures, even the flea and “things too small to see,” have a mystical quality about them.

This is an essential book for all public and school libraries and an excellent book for parents to share with children aged 3 to 6.

Highly Recommended

Citation

Bogart, Jo Ellen., “Big and Small, Room for All.,” Canadian Book Review Annual Online, accessed September 20, 2024, https://cbra.library.utoronto.ca/items/show/29093.