Color Crunch! Mix It Up by Herve' Tullet
IT'S THAT TIME AGAIN. ARE YOU READY?
TAP THAT LITTLE GREY SPOT JUST A LITTLE. WHAT HAPPENS?
Herve' Tullet is back with another brain stretching "interactive book," this time devoted to the basics of colors--primary, secondary, and tertiary. With dots of paint so real-looking--wet and shiny--that you expect your finger tip to be colored as you follow the creator's directions,
Tullet takes youngsters through what happens when they combine blobs of blue and yellow and red, producing such realistic results with each page turn that they seem to be occurring for real! Tullet advances through the secondary colors--orange, green, and purple-- and proceeds into mixing in white or black to create hues and shades--white and red becomes pink in a wink of a page turn. Want to see? OK!
Tullet tells the reader to close the book and smoosh the runny colors on a double page spread, and then tempts speculation as he asks readers to predict what will happen. What happens when you give the book a shake and turn the page? Look and see!
Although this book is aimed toward preschoolers learning the science and art of colors, the faux interactive aspect will have even older kids and adults drawn into the fun, shaking and squishing the book on cue. And it's going to be hard not to break out some paints and play with the knowledge Tullet imparts as soon as he bids readers goodbye.
YOU'RE ON YOUR OWN. LOOK! PLAY!
And Mix It Up!
they will, as author-illustrator Herve' Tullet invites them to do in his 2014 innovative virtual art lesson without the mess for Chronicle Books. As he does in his brilliant and best-selling Press Here
and Help! We Need a Title!
(read reviews here), Tullet joins other author-illustrators, such as Mo Willems, Kathryn Otoshi, Bill Cotter, and Alex Lluch, who have taken on the challenge of electronic storytelling to show that there's a lot of possibilities going on yet between the covers of the classic picture book. "Rivaling an iPad for its sheer fun and interactive elements," is the way School Library Journal describes Tullet's latest in their starred rave review.
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(Handprint Books, 2019). Done up in scribbly line and vivid color against bright, white pages, Tullet celebrates the joys of creation, not to mention the fun, as he did in his best-selling 
and 
(Chronicle Books, 2017, also adds the dimension of sound, as youngsters are urged to "Say Zoop!" say "OHOAHAHOHOH!" and "ROOOH! RAAAH!" It's both eye candy and a chance to sound off in one little book.
and many more metabooks by him and by his fellow artists. (See reviews 
(Chronicle Books, 2016), gives the old imagination a vigorous workout, following the exhortations to follow the bouncing yellow ball with each page turn. Sometimes the yellow disc goes solo, and sometimes he is joined by friends in red and blue. Sometimes he follows the dotted black line, and sometimes he freelances all over the page. Sometimes he hides, and at one point, he is obscured by some strange force which wants to scribble in black marker all over the page. But he rises to the occasion, as promised.
(Henry Holt, 2014). Using some of the interactive techniques pioneered recently by Herve' Tullet's bestsellers, 
in April Fool's Day style Byrne likewise does away with the "fourth wall" and invites the reader into the story, if not to be a visible character, to be a mover and and shaker in the plot! Byrne's illustrations of the primly turned-out Bella and her improbably humongous dog are drawn as deceptively conventional cartoon characters, but his story invites young readers right into story as invisible hands. Kids will find this a book they have to share immediately with someone else just to let them in on the joke.
for some mind-stretching experiences with just what can happen within the covers of the modern picture book when author decide to shake things up.
(Little, Brown and Company, 2019). But will they? Now Abner and Ian need a nap! All they need is for someone to close the book and make it be nice and dark in there. 
and 
and sequels, artist Laura Park lets the illustrations tell the meta-story with some charm and wry humor. This one is a fun read-aloud for grown-ups (who will appreciate some sophisticated asides planted for them by the author) and especially for youngsters who cut their literary teeth on Mo Willems' Elephant and Piggy early reader series. Says Booklist, "A mind changer for anyone who every thought reading was a sedate occupation!"
(Margaret K. Elderry Books, 2014). As an introductory colors book for the nursery school set, as a review for older youngsters, or even as an easy reader, Wilson's rhythm and rhyme put kids through their paces, while Jane Chapman's familiar illustrations are just as charming as ever for fans of Wilson's best-selling Bear series, which began with 
in 2002.
(Harper, 2015). Everybody's doing it these days, upbraiding (or sometimes urging) their readers about turning the page, and pressing a button (or NOT), and Crowley's droll little detective has got his perpetrator collared. Crowley's whimsical black and white line drawings, accented only with touches of red and blue, are the main attraction, right down to the tell-tale fingerprint on the moon visible through Officer Panda's bedroom window.
will definitely get the joke here. As Kirkus quips, "Officer Panda's investigation is not a great introduction to the justice system, but for readers with the right sense of humor, it has plenty of other delights." 
