Water Land

April 1, 2018

Gr 3-5-In this spare text, 12 words (lake, island, strait, isthmus, and so on) bring different landforms and water bodies around the world to light for early learners. Cleverly constructed thick, die-cut pages add interest to the concise narrative. There's a visual surprise with each spread. The cutouts change the scene with every page turn. For example, an image showing a ball-tossing duo at a bay turns into a sunbather bracing for an incoming wave at the cape on the next spread. A young girl looking through a telescope at birds at the gulf turns into a girl on a peninsula looking at a pirate ship. Pages trade off from blue to yellow, representing water and land. People of varying skin tones are shown. An appended foldout sheet offers a map of the world which further explains locations hinted at in the text. VERDICT A lovely, imaginative look at water masses and landforms for a young audience.-Anne Chapman Callaghan, Racine Public Library, WI

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2018
As the subtitle indicates, Hale contrasts five water forms with five landforms in her minimalist informational picture book.On the verso of the first double-page spread, a child revels in a windy swirl of falling maple leaves against a butter-yellow background, while on the recto another lounges in a boat on a small, clear blue body of water. The word "lake" is printed in boldface type above that body of water, the color precisely matching that of the water. Turning the page, readers see the lake is actually a die cut: the lake-shaped hole from the previous page is now an island-shaped hole, filled in with the yellow background from the previous spread. The word "island" sits underneath, its color matching the sands of the landform it represents. Hale's art is playful and appealing but never overwhelming or distracting as she uses the die cuts and precise color to establish unmistakable visual connections. A diversity of skin tones and implied genders are included in each spread, although there is no diversity of body shape nor visual hints at disability. Logically, the concepts depend on forms where land and water meet: lake and island, bay and cape, strait and isthmus, system of lakes and archipelago, gulf and peninsula. An end foldout provides a map, form definitions, and example locations across the globe.The die cuts dividing water from land are vulnerable to little hands, but their value more than delivers. (Informational picture book. 4-8)

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Starred review from April 15, 2018
Preschool-G *Starred Review* This inventive and informative book introduces aquatic-related geographic concepts. Each full-page spread has a single term?such as cape or archipelago?set on a happy scene of diverse groups of people interacting with and enjoying the environment, from recreation to transportation to pirate spotting. And for each one, the concept itself is depicted with an imaginative die-cut that, with the turn of a page, transforms a gulf into a peninsula, or a strait into an isthmus, and so forth, demonstrating how one is often the opposite of the other. There are 10 in total, each of which has, in the back matter, an illustrated definition that elucidates those opposites ( A lake is a body of water surrounded by land. An island is a piece of land surrounded by water ), and, in a large fold-out map, an example of where one can be found on earth, along with a list of some distinctive examples, such as the lake cluster of Pokhara Valley in Nepal and South Africa's Walker Bay. There are fun details to pore over in each textured picture, which draw on Hale's particular skill with nature scenes, and the pages are sturdy, well designed, and quite charming.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)