This exquisite new edition of a small Tomi Ungerer treasure from the early 1960s is…a visual finding game delivered with a blast of psychedelic color and Ungerer's inimitable style…It's a fantastic chance to appreciate the unity and range of Ungerer's sophisticated lines: He gives the same sly, playful attitude to animals in the wild, dressed-up grown-ups doing grown-up things, and children being children.
The New York Times Book Review - Maria Russo
"This treasure hunt makes for jolly good fun given the playfulness of Ungerer’s illustrations."—Spirituality and Practice
"Tomi Ungerer's drawing talent was and is prodigious and he is mercurially inventive with words and ideas. His lengthening rack of children's books have become genre classics."—Man of the World
"This exquisite new edition of a small Tomi Ungerer treasure from the early 1960s is a visual finding game delivered with a blast of psychedelic color and Ungerer’s inimitable style."—The New York Times Book Review
"The illustrations are whimsical and bright, and their imaginative quirkiness elevates Ungerer’s work from standard concept book fare to a more noteworthy, thought-provoking, and unique experience."—School Library
06/01/2015 PreS-Gr 1—First published in 1962, Ungerer's classic concept book has been repackaged for a new generation of children. The nearly wordless picture book invites readers to search for snails hidden within each illustration. These are not outright depictions of snails, but rather spiral shapes, like those of a snail shell, seamlessly blended into Ungerer's creative—albeit eccentric—drawings. Thus, snails can be found in all sorts of odd and unlikely places, such as ocean waves, the curled-up trunk of an elephant, and the circular pattern on the ice made by a twirling figure skater. The result is a clever and unusual picture puzzle challenge, in which children are asked to conceptualize the shape of a snail and find it hidden throughout a varied set of madcap pictures. VERDICT Despite their simple lines and colors, the illustrations are whimsical and bright, and their imaginative quirkiness elevates Ungerer's work from standard concept book fare to a more noteworthy, thought-provoking, and unique experience.—Laura J. Giunta, Garden City Public Library, NY
Old favorites come to the fore in revitalized editions. First published in 1962, Tomi Ungerer's classic concept book Snail, Where Are You? is now a lift-the-flap book, with strategically placed die-cuts in sturdy overlays that help youngsters put their fingers on the snail in each painting, whether on the crest of a wave, the hat of a jester, or the curly tale of a plump pink pig. Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Ungerer's nearly wordless 1962 title gets a thorough makeover, with anonymously written answers to the repeatedly posed title question, bright new colors and most significantly, a new format that features folded-over pages with small die-cut holes. Each hole reveals a bit of snail-shell-like curl that turns out to be something else-a wave, a tail, a horn (musical or otherwise), a ringlet of hair-until the snail at last puts in an appearance. Literal-minded readers may be confused by the closing invitation to go back and count the "snails," as there's really only the one-but the original's silliness survives intact, and the new packaging puts on a handsome show. (Picture book. 5-7)