School Library Journal Review
PreS-K-Each spread illustrates activities above and below ground in specific locales: a house and its cellar, a stage, a picnic spot, the Antarctic, a jungle, a city street, a desert, a vegetable garden, two boats, a golf course, and a suburban street. The colorful, computer-generated pictures are elaborate and interesting. Most of the below-ground scenes are fairly plausible, but others include animals playing cards, reading, etc. The one beneath the golf course humorously shows gophers using machinelike contraptions to recycle golf balls. The scenes are separated by rhyming couplets. Unfamiliar words such as "performing," "crew," "unaware," and "conceals" offer good teaching moments. Children will want to pore over the details and think about the many activities depicted in the art. Pair this title with Arlene Mosel's The Funny Little Woman (Puffin, 1993) for another amusing depiction of what goes on above and below ground.-Lynda Ritterman, Atco Elementary School, Waterford, NJ (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Redding, a British graphic designer making her children's book debut, compares the action above and below ground in a wide range of lively settings (a theatre, the ocean, a neighborhood). She splits each digitally rendered spread horizontally down the middle; the jam-packed goings-on in each half play off of one another. Some scenes are rooted in the real world: as passengers on an excursion ship "enjoy a cruise around the bay," their leisurely attitudes contrast with the smartly outfitted and clearly conscientious crew below, portrayed swabbing the floor, checking instruments and generally "work[ing] hard throughout the day." Other pairings, however, emit a good-hearted silliness. "Golfers play with golf balls. Gophers do, too," Redding writes. "But they play with them differently than you and I do!" Below the greens, a team of rodents recycles duffers' balls with the help of a Rube Goldberg?esque conveyor belt. Redding's stylized work brings to mind the cartoons turned out by the old Max Fleischer studios; she employs a cast of google-eyed characters, and displays a fondness for using manic graphic patterns and diagrammatic layouts. Ages 3-up. (June) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
