The Belly Book

by Fran Manushkin, Dan Yaccarino (Illustrator)

Overview

Bellies come in all shapes and sizes: baby bellies, grown-up bellies, animal bellies. Some bellies are soft. Some bellies are firm. Round or flat, all bellies deserve a happy pat.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781429960311
Publisher:	Feiwel & Friends
Publication date:	11/08/2011
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	32
File size:	61 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	2 - 5 Years

About the Author

Fran Manushkin is the author of numerous books for children. She lives in New York City.

Dan Yaccarino's many books include Cooking with Henry and Elliebelly by Carolyn Parkhurst. He is also the creator of the television series Oswald and Willa's Wild Life. Dan lives in New York City with his wife and two children.

Editorial Reviews

“This book encourages children to think positively about a body part that is often hidden away or rejected.” —School Library Journal

“With snappy rhymes, bright bold graphics, and a winning sense of playfulness, Manushkin follows The Tushy Book with a salute to the body's middle ground, this time teaming up with Yaccarino.” —Publishers Weekly

“Delightful art adds panache to this simple ode to a familiar body part.” —Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

A meditation on the middle for beginning readers and younger listeners supports some appealingly merry illustrations. Manushkin's rhyming text is an invitation to a general celebration of abdomens--readers' own or other peoples', and occasionally those of beasts and birds--in all their rounded but not-very-unusual variety. The verse serves as an adequate vehicle for the art, which is the real treat here, with Yaccarino's clever, energetic, lighthearted illustration: His round-headed, round-bodied people are set against brightly colored blocks and patterns with symmetry and syncopation. Throughout, Manushkin uses only the word belly for the front of the torso, with one exception: "Once upon a time your mummy / grew you--right inside her tummy." She humorously points out that belly-button lint is kind of mysterious ("Where it comes from, no one knows!"). When the easy-to-read rhymes start to stretch thin, relying on lists ("Parade your bellies from here to Spain. / Bellies in the desert! / Bellies in the rain!"), Yaccarino plumps them up with an artful twinkle: A slim, floating, belly-buttoned green alien in a white bikini accompanies "In outer space! In a bikini!" His playful full-page gouaches zip nimbly from thought to thought and invest the whole with a generous dollop of whimsy. Delightful art adds panache to this simple ode to a familiar body part. (Picture book. 2-6)

Kirkus Reviews