THE BOOK: Circle by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen, from Candlewick Press for $15.99.
Klassen and Barnett have created six of the century's wittiest, most-fun-to-share picture books for kids, Sam and Dave Dig a Hole; The Wolf, the Duck, and the Mouse; Extra Yarn; and their Shape trilogy, which Circle completes.
Illustrator Klassen (I Want My Hat Back, This Is Not My Hat, We Found a Hat) summons a lovely, ominous world from a limited palette. Barnett's smart, spare text brings recognizably childish voices to life.
THE STORY: Circle teaches her friends Square and Triangle to play hide-n-seek with one rule: No hiding behind the waterfall. It's dark back there. Triangle immediately hides behind the waterfall. Square tattles. Circle steels herself, and in she goes.
What is back there? Something!
Like Square and Triangle, Circle teaches shapes while challenging kids to think, in this case, about what they know and don't know.
AGES: Candlewick suggests 5-9, and the dark place could be scary for a toddler; but 31/2-year-old Test Child had eager opinions about the unseen shape lurking in the dark.
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Read to Me is a weekly review of really short books.
Style on 03/25/2019