Swatch: The Girl Who Loved Color

by Julia Denos, Julia Denos (Illustrator)

Overview

A vibrant picture book featuring an irrepressible new character—perfect for fans of The Dot and Beautiful Oops!—from acclaimed illustrator Julia Denos. 

In a place where color ran wild, there lived a girl who was wilder still. Her name was Swatch, and color was her passion. From brave green to in-between gray to rumble-tumble pink . . . Swatch wanted to collect them all. But colors don’t always like to be tamed. . . .

This is an exuberant celebration of all the beauty and color that make up our lives.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062366382
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	03/15/2016
Pages:	40
Product dimensions:	11.00(w) x 8.70(h) x 0.60(d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Julia Denos is the author-illustrator of Swatch: The Girl Who Loved Color and the illustrator of several children’s books, including Just Being Audrey by Margaret Cardillo, I Had a Favorite Dress by Boni Ashburn, Dotty by Erica S. Perl, Grandma’s Gloves by Cecil Castellucci, and Letters to Leo by Amy Hest. Julia currently lives in Boston. You can visit her online at www.juliadenos.com.

Julia Denos is the author-illustrator of Swatch: The Girl Who Loved Color and the illustrator of several children’s books, including Just Being Audrey by Margaret Cardillo, I Had a Favorite Dress by Boni Ashburn, Dotty by Erica S. Perl, Grandma’s Gloves by Cecil Castellucci, and Letters to Leo by Amy Hest. Julia currently lives in Boston. You can visit her online at www.juliadenos.com.

Editorial Reviews

The gorgeous illustrations are enough to recommend this title, but the sweet message makes it a must-read; a great read-aloud.” — School Library Journal

“Denos’ text is fierce and crisp, her color-characters wondrous...spellbinding.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Praise for JUST BEING AUDREY: “Denos’ soft pastel illustrations cut just the right Audrey outline (complete with flapping neck scarf), and fans will especially enjoy picking out the movie roles depicted in a two-page spread of costumes.” — Booklist

Praise for JUST BEING AUDREY: “Audrey Hepburn proves as irresistible a character in the pages of a children’s book as she is in those soigné roles of the silver screen.” — Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher

Praise for JUST BEING AUDREY: “Denos’ soft pastel illustrations cut just the right Audrey outline (complete with flapping neck scarf), and fans will especially enjoy picking out the movie roles depicted in a two-page spread of costumes.

Booklist

Praise for JUST BEING AUDREY: “Denos’ soft pastel illustrations cut just the right Audrey outline (complete with flapping neck scarf), and fans will especially enjoy picking out the movie roles depicted in a two-page spread of costumes.

Booklist

05/01/2016
PreS-Gr 2—In this beautifully illustrated picture book, children are introduced to the idea that wild things should be wild. Readers follow the title character, Swatch, as she catches and tames hues. With surrealist imagery and swirling colors, the artwork draws readers in. The message underlying the stunning images asks kids to consider how we should treat wild things. While the text is at times moralizing, the balance of the overall work is excellent. The pace at which the story unfolds is quick enough to keep children's attention while slow enough to beg the pondering of the work's larger themes. The high-quality value and gradation of the color pull children into Swatch's world. While the text at times seems to jump across the page, it generally adds to the tone. This is also a wonderful choice for vocabulary building. The composition and flow allow the pictures to shine, while gently pushing readers forward. VERDICT The gorgeous illustrations are enough to recommend this title, but the sweet message makes it a must-read; a great read-aloud.—Lauren Lancaster, Crafton Public Library, Pittsburgh

School Library Journal

★ 2016-01-09
Swatch is a color whisperer. On bright white backgrounds, "in a place where colors ran wild," Swatch—skinny, almond-eyed, and peach-skinned, with a striped shirt and ever changing headbands—tames swaths of color as if they're animals. She bends and leaps, creeps and crouches; she stands on a fire hydrant and stretches impossibly upward to reach inky blue sky. Colors gush and burst around her—are they emanating from her hands and brushes or borne on the breeze? She hunts them wherever they are: "Bravest Green shot up the first week of March," while "In-Between Gray lived on her kitten's leg." Denos' text is fierce and crisp, her color-characters wondrous. Using a tight range of hue with spellbinding shapes and textures in watercolor, ink, and pencil, she creates a blue squall swirling with movement, simultaneously watery, sharp, and gusting. A yellow yawns and billows, part wind, part fox, part sunlight—but also purring and buttery. Despite Swatch's label as a "tamer," the colors all live free, visiting her of their own accord—"until the day she lured Just-Laid Blue straight from its nest and into a jam jar." Now she's trapping colors in glass jars, where they circle restlessly. But Yellowest Yellow, the last uncaptured color, shines bright on a sidewalk flower; they converse, and Swatch remembers about freedom. For color wranglers and windblown spirits everywhere. (Picture book. 4-7)

Kirkus Reviews