Twice My Size

PreSchool-Grade 2Beginning with a tiny ladybug playing with a butterfly, a succession of animals is introduced, each of which frolics with a friend who is twice as big. Literal-minded children will no doubt point out that the butterfly is actually much more than twice the size of the ladybug. Nonetheless, the book still functions as an introduction to relative size. Youngsters will enjoy guessing what creature is going to appear. On the page opposite the ladybug, just the butterflys wings are visible. On the next page, the whole butterfly is shown with the huge head of a bird on the page opposite, then the whole bird (smaller now) juxtaposed with the big tail of a squirrel, and so on. At the end, an enormous whale praises his friend up in the sky, the Sun, who is a million times bigger than all of them. The colorful illustrations are laid out gracefully and the large, legible text is nicely integrated into the book design and sometimes curves around the art. The illustrator has used a combination of woodcuts and oil-based paint to create bold, flat, and subtly mottled images done in predominately pastel hues. At storytimes, even the children sitting at the back of the room will be able to appreciate these simple but effective pictures.Sue Norris, Rye Free Reading Room, NY
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A ladybug perched on a bright sunflower announces, "I've got a friend who's twice my size--his bright wings flitter and flutter as he flies." Youngsters might correctly guess the friend is a butterfly, and a turn of the page will confirm it. The butterfly has a "feathery friend twice as big as me" (a bird), and the guessing game continues, with each animal introducing a larger friend. The bouncy, rhyming text is catchy and fun, but it isn't strictly accurate: Isn't a butterfly more than twice the size of a ladybug? A squirrel is surely more than twice the weight of a tiny bird. By the same token, the illustrations are filled with pleasing bright colors and bold shapes, but they only make it more obvious that the author's comparisons are inaccurate. Still, there's much to like here. Kids will enjoy the guessing game, and a surprise ending showing the sun outdoing the whale as the largest friend of all is really very nicely done. The lively rhyming text makes this a great read-aloud choice as well. Lauren Peterson