Fall Mixed Up

by Robert Raczka, Chad Cameron (Illustrator)

Overview

Fall is all mixed up in this silly book from Bob Raczka! Can you find his mistakes in the words and pictures?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780761346067
Publisher:	Lerner Publishing Group
Publication date:	08/01/2011
Pages:	32
Sales rank:	481,199
Product dimensions:	9.26(w) x 11.24(h) x 0.32(d)
Lexile:	AD530L (what's this?)
Age Range:	7 - 8 Years

About the Author

Author of the art appreciation series, Bob Raczka's Art Adventures, Bob Raczka studied both art and advertising in college. He has worked as an advertising writer for 30+ years, and has published more than 30 children's books. His work has received multiple awards including the Claudia Lewis Award for his first poetry book, Guyku: A Year of Haiku for Boys, and a Charlotte Zolotow Honor for Niko Draws a Feeling. Bob and his wife Amy have three grown children, Robert, Carl and Emma, plus two dogs, Penny and Pippa. He is based in Illinois.

Chad Cameron's earliest work was rendered in Crayola with a crude overhand technique on his bedroom walls. This expressionist body of work came to include drawings on other clean surfaces, his little brother, and a fair attempt at the family cat. This didn't go over well with the critics.

Eventually, the critics sent him away to college where he received a BFA in Communication Arts and Design from Virginia Commonwealth University. Since then he has endeavored to spend his time with flying pigs, blue space aliens and the occasional levitating cow. In 2005 he received an MFA from Academy of Art University where he is a now a part-time instructor.

Editorial Reviews

With giddy abandon, Cameron's (A Day with No Crayons) bustling, mixed-media artwork has fun with this story's gleefully wacky premise. Moving from windswept, daytime panoramas to shadowy evenings, the pictures leave no doubt that much is awry this autumn: a boy bites into an orange apple as kids in a hot-air balloon attempt to capture leaves that rise rather than fall from trees. Raczka's (Guyku) merry, rat-a-tat verse reveals that animals' behavior is also askew: "Bears gather nuts./ Geese hibernate./ Squirrels fly south in/ big figure eights." Readers will eagerly scour illustrations to decipher the text's ramifications. On a spread in which "Hats cover hands./ Gloves cover ears./ Bonfires cool off our/ fronts and our rears," the children's reversed glove and hat placement is obvious; less so is the ice covering the marshmallows that they (and a snowman) roast over a fire. Even observant kids may not pick up on all of the art's switcheroos on the first read, and will gladly follow Raczka's parting directive to "Go back and find all the/ things that aren't right." Ages 4–9. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

"Illustrations rendered in warm colors capture the silliness of the brief text. Kids will have fun following the final instructions to 'Go back and find all the / things that aren't right.'" —The Horn Book Guide

From the Publisher

PreS-Gr 2—Text and illustrations depict mixed-up imagery of autumn, as in "Apples turn orange./Pumpkins turn red./Leaves float up/into blue skies overhead." Soft-focus illustrations with occasional sharp collage elements show the zany world described by each verse. The last line of the book invites readers to go back and find "all the things that aren't right," but most of the errors have already been pointed out by the text. The mix-ups are silly and not particularly witty, and the book does nothing to evoke the feeling of the season or to shed light on any of its symbols. This is a gimmick book that will not bear repeated readings. With so many fall books available, it can easily be skipped.—Heidi Estrin, Feldman Children's Library at Congregation B'nai Israel, Boca Raton, FL

School Library Journal