First the Egg
Seeger, Laura Vaccaro
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BOOK SYNOPSIS
WHICH CAME FIRST? The chicken or the egg? Simple die-cuts magically present transformation-- from seed to flower, tadpole to frog, caterpillar to butterfly. The acclaimed author of Black? White! Day? Night! and Lemons Are Not Red gives an entirely fresh and memorable presentation to the concepts of transformation and creatiity. Seed becomes flower, paint becomes picture, word becomes story--and the commonplace becomes extraordinary as children look through and turn the pages of this novel and winning book.
AUTHOR BIO
Laura Vaccaro Seeger is an Emmy-award winning artist and the critically acclaimed author and illustrator of The Hidden Alphabet, Lemons Are Not Red, Walter Was Worried, and Black? White! Day? Night! All were named ALA Notable Books and Child Magazine Best Books of the Year. Her most recent work is Dog and Bear, which Publishers Weekly called "utterly charming" in a starred review.
BOOK REVIEWS
Publishers Weekly In another nimble page-turner, Seeger (Black? White! Day? Night!) toys with die-cuts and strategically paired words. She introduces a chicken-or-egg dilemma on her books cover, picturing a plump white egg in a golden-brown nest. Remove the die-cut dust jacket, and a hen appears on the glossy inner cover. The eggshell, thickly brushed in bluish-white and cream, also serves as the chickens feathers. This first/then pattern is repeated (First the egg/ then the chicken./ First the tadpole/ then the frog), with a die-cut on every other page. By flipping a page, readers see the cutout in two contexts. For instance, when an ovoid shape is superimposed on a white ground, its an egg; on a yolk-yellow ground, its the body of a baby chick. Seeger lines up the recto and verso of every sheet, maintaining a casual mood with generous swabs of grassy greens, sky blues and oxide yellows on canvas. Given the exuberant imagery, the occasional cutout (like the fingernail-size seed of a blowsy peony-pink flower) looks none too impressive. But if minuscule die-cuts seem barely worth the trouble, they do imply the potential in humble sources. Seegers clever conclusion brings all the elements together in an outdoor scene that returns readers to the opening: First the paint/ then the picture / First the chicken/ then the egg! Ages 2-6. (Sept.) Kirkus Reviews Starred Review A deceptively simple, decidedly playful sequence of statements invites readers to ponder, what comes first: the chicken or the egg? Carefully choreographed page turns and die-cuts focus on the process of change and becoming, so First sits alone on a yellow background, facing the EGGan egg-shaped die-cut revealing a white egg against an orange-and-brown background. Turn the page, and then appears, the egg-shaped die-cut now forming the yellow body of a chick emerging from the shell, facing the CHICKENthe white hen whose body gave color to the previous spreads egg. Tadpole and frog, seed and flower, caterpillar and butterfly all receive the same treatment, then word and story, paint and picture bring all the disparate elements together, nature being the catalyst for art. Seegers vibrant, textured oil-on-canvas illustrations contain a wealth of subtlety, allowing the die-cuts to reveal cunning surprises with each turn of the page. Children and adults alike will delight in flipping the sturdy pages back and forth to recreate the transformations over and over again. Another perfectly pitched triumph from an emerging master of the concept book. (Picture book. 2-6) New York Times Childrens Books Bestseller List at #9
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MORE BOOK INFO
ISBN: 1596432721
ISBN(13-digit): 9781596432727
Dewey Decimal: 571.8
Library of Congress: 2006032924
Book Publisher: Henry Holt & Co
Language: ENG
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