Hello Baby!

Starred review from February 2, 2009
Like her Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes
, Fox's newest has all the marks of a lap-sit classic. In mellifluous motherese, the narrator poses a series of playful questions to a baby: “Are you a monkey with clever toes?/ Perhaps you're a porcupine, twitching its nose.” After 11 more such guesses (featuring such animal faves as the gecko, the hippo and the warthog), the narrator finally gets it right: “Wait, let me guess—Are you my treasure? The answer is... Yes!” While Fox is cooing as only she can, Jenkins (What Do You Do with a Tail Like This?
) works his usual magic with cut paper. In many of his large-scale closeups—the images spill across and off the spreads—his subjects' big, expressive eyes seem locked in a gaze with the reader. Ingeniously stylized shapes (like the coils of gray paper that form an elephant's trunk) combine with sumptuous detailing that brings alive the parade of scales, fur and feathers. Ages 3–5.

April 1, 2009
PreS-Fox's rhyming text is pure fun. In a layout reminiscent of Bill Martin, Jr.'s "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" (Holt, 1983), an unseen narrator says, "Hello, baby!/Who are you?" and the speculated answers range from the familiar elephant to an exotic gecko. "Are you a zebra/sipping a drink?/Perhaps you're an owl/with a wicked wink." A spread near the end of the book provides an opportunity to name the baby animals by looking at their silhouettes. Jenkins's beautifully shaded and textured collages are stand-alone works of art, each of which holds its own with Fox's engaging cadences. This collaboration results in a lovely read-aloud for preschool storytimes or a perfect selection for one-on-one sharing."Lisa Glasscock, Columbine Public Library, Littleton, CO"

Copyright 2009 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 15, 2009
Preschool As in her best-selling title Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes (2008), a Booklist Editors Choice selection, Fox creates an affectionate, singsong picture book directed straight at small children. Here, her rhyming couplets take the form of queries inviting kids to compare themselves to a zoo full of animals: Are you a monkey with clever toes? Perhaps youre a porcupine, twitching its nose. A few forced lines distract from the majority of the polished, smooth text: Are you a leopard, dozing at dusk? Perhaps youre an elephant, wielding a tusk. As a whole, though, the book has an almost hypnotic rhythm, which, depending on readers inflections, could either lull sleepy toddlers into dreamland or entice them to action. Working in his signature medium of cut-paper collage, Jenkins coaxes clear expressions out ofhis animal subjects, even as his precision helps viewers zero in on the animals features noted in the text. In the end, a clever visual matching game leads into a loving affirmation for every child.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)