Review by Kirkus Book Review
A counting book features animals and colors in Mandarin Chinese and English. This board book presents the months of the year along with a dozen images in an attempt to spark a bilingual learning experience. Colorful illustrations that resemble paper craft collages depict a random assortment of creatures amid natural scenery: Two bears doze on snow-covered ground in February, four robins perch on blossomed branches in April, seven crabs float among reeds in July, and so on. For each entry, Lee lists a number, the month, and a phrase ("ONE white crane") in English and Mandarin. The text is perplexing due to its structure, which shows words in two languages yet provides no background information that would facilitate reading aloud for aspiring language learners. The lack of contextual explanation leaves monolingual readers to puzzle out, for example, the connection between January and the number one or October and the number 10. Likewise, without a pronunciation guide or grounding concepts--such as the customary usage of words in the Chinese language that indicate units or groupings--only those readers with some knowledge of Mandarin as a monosyllabic tonal language or who are familiar with Hanyu Pinyin would find this romanization system relevant. Even so, the Pinyin layout is occasionally inconsistent. The bilingual format may interest Chinese readers who are learning English. (This book was reviewed digitally.) Scarce appeal for readers who are not already literate in both languages. (Board book. 3-5) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
