Triangle

by Mac Barnett, Jon Klassen (Illustrator)

Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller

Barnett and Klassen's token silliness takes on a new shape in this wonderfully ridiculous story (the first in a series) about the tomfoolery of geometric pals.

Part of the Shapes Trilogy, the books that inspired Shape Island from Apple TV+

Multi-award-winning, New York Times best-selling duo Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen conspire again on a slyly funny tale about some very sneaky shapes.

Meet Triangle. He is going to play a sneaky trick on his friend, Square. Or so Triangle thinks. . . . With this first tale in a new trilogy, partners in crime Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen will have readers wondering just who they can trust in a richly imagined world of shapes. Visually stunning and full of wry humor, here is a perfectly paced treat that could come only from the minds of two of today’s most irreverent — and talented — picture book creators.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781039705876
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	06/01/2024
Pages:	48
Product dimensions:	8.80(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.30(d)
Language:	French
Age Range:	4 - 9 Years

About the Author

Mac Barnett, the 2025–2026 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, is a New York Times best-selling author of stories for children. His work has been translated into more than thirty languages and sold more than five million copies worldwide. Mac Barnett’s books have won many prizes, including two Caldecott Honors, three New York Times/ New York Public Library Best Illustrated Children’s Book Awards, three E. B. White Read-Aloud Awards, the Boston Globe–Horn Book Award, Germany’s Jugendliteraturpreis, China’s Chen Bochui International Children’s Literature Award, the Netherlands’ Zilveren Griffel, and Italy’s Premio Orbil. He is the cocreator, with Jon Klassen, of the Substack Looking at Picture Books, as well as Shape Island, a stop-motion animated series on Apple TV+, based on their best-selling Shapes series of picture books. Mac Barnett lives in Oakland, California.

Jon Klassen is the author-illustrator of I Want My Hat Back, a Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor Book; This Is Not My Hat, winner of the Caldecott Medal and the Kate Greenaway Medal; and We Found a Hat. He is also the illustrator of two Caldecott Honor Books, Sam and Dave Dig a Hole and Extra Yarn, both written by Mac Barnett. Jon Klassen lives in Los Angeles.

Editorial Reviews

★ 01/09/2017
In the first book of a planned trilogy from the team behind two Caldecott Honor winners (Extra Yarn and Sam and Dave Dig a Hole), Triangle plots some serious mischief. He’s a charcoal-colored triangle with sticklike legs and Klassen’s famous shifty-eyed stare, and he plans to frighten his friend Square. Triangle sets off through the triangles in his neighborhood, across a wilderness of rocky mounds (“They were shapes with no names,” Barnett intones) and on through a lot of squares to Square’s house. “I will play my sneaky trick,” Triangle announces. He hisses like a snake, Square is terrified, and there’s a moment of silent, incandescent fury as Square glares at Triangle across the page. Square chases Triangle home and blocks his door, leaving Triangle in the dark, which frightens him right back. “You see, Triangle,” Square crows, “this was my plan all along.” Barnett ends with a rhetorical question for readers: “But do you really believe him?” Since the final spread shows Square stuck fast in the triangular doorway, the answer, clearly, is a resounding “No!” Klassen’s palette is quiet, his weathered backdrops are elegant, and his comic timing is precisely synched to Barnett’s deadpan prose. Triangle fools Square, and the story fools readers, too, as they wait for Square to put Triangle in his place, or for the two to reconcile. Instead, Triangle seems to win this round, even if he does finish the book trapped in his own home. Whereas the humor in Sam and Dave Dig a Hole was subtle and sly, this shape showdown is pure, antic buffoonery. Ages 5–9. Agent: Steven Malk, Writers House. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

Klassen’s palette is quiet, his weathered backdrops are elegant, and his comic timing is precisely synched to Barnett’s deadpan prose. Triangle fools Square, and the story fools readers, too, as they wait for Square to put Triangle in his place, or for the two to reconcile. Instead, Triangle seems to win this round, even if he does finish the book trapped in his own home. Whereas the humor in Sam and Dave Dig a Hole was subtle and sly, this shape showdown is pure, antic buffoonery.
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Barnett and Klassen, whose previous collaborations—Extra Yarn (2012) and Sam and Dave Dig a Hole (2014)—were Caldecott Honor Books, have created a marvelously clever picture book...The simple sentences and repetition are perfect for a young audience, who will be raptly interested in the devious dynamic between the friends. Judging by this offbeat first volume, Barnett and Klassen’s planned trilogy is shaping up to be an excellent one.
—Booklist (starred review)

Klassen's minimalist visuals make for beautiful, surreal landscapes as the shapes go back and forth; Barnett's even-more-minimalist narrative leaves gaps of many shapes and sizes for readers to ponder. Children will be intrigued by the fairy-tale quality of this narrative and may enjoy debating the motivations of its peculiar characters.
—Kirkus Reviews

Cheeky Triangle and ingenuous Square's quirky relationship is reminiscent of Arnold Lobel's Frog and Toad, but with a twist. Klassen does remarkable things with a minimal canvas — shapes and eyes are all he's got, after all...This weird and wonderful picture book presents a whole new angle on shapes —and friendships.
—Shelf Awareness for Readers

Both the occasionally repetitive text and the images make this title a good match for emerging readers. The characters convey an appropriate level of shifty expression through the movement of their eyes, and the ambiguous ending will elicit plenty of opinions from young audiences. An understated ode to mischief that’s sure to please fans of Sam and Dave Dig a Hole.
—School Library Journal

Fans of this author-illustrator team, and of each creator individually, will recognize elements such as Klassen’s trademark simple shapes, sumptuous textures, and expressive eyes, not to mention a pesky antihero and a chase scene that goes in one direction, then back...The appended dedication and biography page includes visual confirmation that the story’s events were all in good fun.
—The Horn Book

There's a lesson about friendship along with an amusing geometry lesson in this charming picture book from the writer-artist collaborators who created the acclaimed "Sam and Dave Dig a Hole" and "Extra Yarn."
—Buffalo News

This is funny stuff and, as to be expected from Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen, delightfully off-kilter.
—BookPage

It’s all in the execution: the perfect text, the visually arresting and funny art (those eyeballs of Klassen’s! He really (re)invented eyeballs in picture books) — it’s a huge read-aloud winner of a book.
—PW ShelfTalker (blog)

Deadpan humor and artistic precision—a combination we’ve come to expect from the wicked Barnett/Klassen collaboration—make this story a joy to read night after night.
—B&N Kids Blog

In the start to another amusing trilogy from the dynamic children’s book duo Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen, some very sneaky shapes are up to no good.
—Pregnancy & Newborn

From the Publisher

04/01/2017
K-Gr 2—A pair of practical jokes will have readers debating who started it in this picture book from the deadpan duo. Readers first meet Triangle, a simple shape with two large eyes and a sturdy pair of legs. Triangle declares that he's going to play a "sneaky trick" on Square, so he sets off across a backdrop of triangular landmarks, through the slightly wilder land of waterfalls and "shapes with no names," into a region of squares to the house of Square, a similarly wide-eyed figure. Hiding outside and hissing like a snake, Triangle frightens Square and soon finds himself fleeing across the sparse landscape, with Square in hot pursuit. Returning to the safety of his triangular home, Triangle discovers that Square has a surprise of his own in store. But was Triangle the original instigator, or was turning the tables always Square's plan? Klassen's distinctive style of digital graphite and watercolor illustrations with lots of white space is well suited to the focus on simple shapes and a circular narrative that ends where it began. The horizontal movement from Triangle's abode to Square's house and back follows a clear line, with plenty of visual cues linking the text and illustrations. Both the occasionally repetitive text and the images make this title a good match for emerging readers. The characters convey an appropriate level of shifty expression through the movement of their eyes, and the ambiguous ending will elicit plenty of opinions from young audiences. VERDICT An understated ode to mischief that's sure to please fans of Sam and Dave Dig a Hole.—Chelsea Couillard-Smith, Hennepin County Library, MN

School Library Journal

2017-01-17
The pairing of Barnett's deceptively simple, tongue-in-cheek text with Klassen's iconic splattered and stenciled watercolor and digital illustrations in earth tones makes for a unique approach to exploring shapes. Triangle, a black shape with stick legs and large eyes, inhabits a triangular house. Tired of triangular living, he leaves his domain and sets out to play a "sneaky trick" on Square. Walking past a forest of different-sized triangles and shapes resembling huge boulders, he comes to the land of the squares. When he arrives at Square's house, he hisses at Square's door like a snake, sending the four-sided shape into conniptions until his laughter gives him away. Mad as heck at the trick, Square chases Triangle back through the forest of shapes to Triangle's house. Alas, his shape prevents him from entering the triangular doorway. Inadvertently, Square discovers Triangle's fear of the dark when he blocks the light from the doorway, causing Triangle to cry out with terror. Square claims this is what he intended all along. "But do you really believe him?" The book is limited as shape instruction, as only two easy shapes are depicted, but that's not really the point. Klassen's minimalist visuals make for beautiful, surreal landscapes as the shapes go back and forth; Barnett's even-more-minimalist narrative leaves gaps of many shapes and sizes for readers to ponder. Children will be intrigued by the fairy-tale quality of this narrative and may enjoy debating the motivations of its peculiar characters. (Picture book. 2-4)

Kirkus Reviews