Review by Booklist Review
Light sent a playful dragon through the streets of a city in Have You Seen My Dragon? (2014), and this time a hirsute monster is lost at the county fair. On wide white pages covered with intricate pen-and-ink line drawings, a little girl entreats the reader to help find her monster. Did he go to judge the pies? she asks, while the monster juggles a few tarts. He loves music! reveals the monster in a jaunty cap leading a marching band. In addition to the lively seek-and-find illustrations, each of the 20 double-page spreads highlights one particular shape, which is filled in with a single hue. And these aren't your everyday circles, squares, and triangles, though those are there, too. Light shows youngsters octagons, rhombuses, quatrefoils, curvilinear triangles, trapeziums, and heptagons, among many others. Though some shapes are a little tough to tell apart, such as the rhombus and parallelogram or oval and ellipse, most kiddos will be too interested in spotting the playful monster to notice. Frolicsome fun with some sneaky education thrown in.--Hunter, Sarah Copyright 2015 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 2-Light uses black-on-white pen-and-ink illustrations for a double concept-first to seek and find a friendly monster at the county fair and second to identify the geometric shapes found there. Each spread features the monster hidden within the drawing, along with the featured shape colored in ink, sometimes just once, sometimes multiple times. The top right corner names the shape and shows its outline, from the triangle, square, and oval to the quatrefoil, trapezium, and heptagon. The Common Core State Standards require different levels of geometric familiarity across the grades, and this book may be useful in introducing the youngest students to those shapes that that they will not be required to know until second grade. The spunky, retro drawings of a curly haired, ovoid-headed little girl and her hairy monster friend send readers from the carousel to the roller coaster, serving also as a primer to an American tradition that many urban students may only meet in a book. Pair this title with Tana Hoban's classic Shapes, Shapes, Shapes (Greenwillow, 1986) for the other side of the coin.a photographic introduction to shapes in found in a city. VERDICT A fun-filled interactive outing with an unintrusive math lesson to boot.-Lisa Lehmuller, East Providence School District, RI (c) Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
A little girl asks the titular question. Preschoolers can look for the creature--and shapes, which appear in color on otherwise black-and-white spreads--at attractions ("Maybe he's already at the fair"). The shapes (e.g., triangular tent flags; a heptagon formed by bumper-car wires) aren't always natural in the detailed pen drawings, but the friendly-looking monster finds some clever hiding spots. (c) Copyright 2015. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A little girl searches for her monster in every corner of the county fair.She asks readers to help her locate her not-very-frightening, curly-haired monster as she visits and enjoys exhibits, rides, games, food vendors and more. Hiding sometimes in plain sight and sometimes more obscurely, he is everywhere she goes. He rides the carousel, flies a kite, indulges in snacks and marches in a parade. Of course she finds him just in time to go home. Light follows up on the techniques employed in his earlier Have You Seen My Dragon? (2014). Busy, black, pen-and-ink line drawings set the scene, capturing all the details of a county fair. Although the monster is purple and the girl is in full color on the cover, they are depicted in black line throughout the work. Simple sentences in large print are prominently placed within the illustrations, and a black banner with white lettering announces the names of brightly colored shapes. A square, rectangle, triangle and circle each make an appearance, along with other familiar shapes. But watch for a quatrefoil, trapezium, nonagon and curvilinear triangle as well. Young readers will be happily engaged in searching for the monster, and finding and identifying the shapes, all the while enjoying the excitement and fun of the fair. Gently educational and greatly entertaining. (Picture book. 3-6) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
