Up & Down

by Britta Teckentrup, Britta Teckentrup (Illustrator)

Overview

Lift the flaps to take Little Penguin on a journey filled with ups and downs.

Little Penguin misses his friend and decides it’s time to visit. Leaping off his iceberg, he embarks on a journey, facing ups and downs and ins and outs until the pair are finally reunited. Young readers will have fun getting hands-on with this interactive book of lift-the-flap opposites, presented in an upmarket format that perfectly showcases Britta Teckentrup’s color-rich artwork.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780763671297
Publisher:	Candlewick Press
Publication date:	10/14/2014
Pages:	28
Product dimensions:	9.30(w) x 11.80(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	2 - 5 Years

About the Author

Britta Teckentrup is a fine artist, writer, and illustrator of many well-loved books for children. Born in Hamburg, Germany, she studied at St. Martin’s College of Art and the Royal College of Art in London.

Editorial Reviews

09/29/2014
A penguin’s journey to reunite with his friend supplies the premise behind this understated and elegantly designed interactive introduction to antonyms. The use of large, well-integrated flaps creates a satisfying sense of motion as readers help Little Penguin travel through the green-blue water past bloblike ocean flora and a variety of fauna, flecked with grainy or marbled patterns (“He swam above a bobbing jellyfish... and below a tickly octopus. He swam over an orca’s tail... then under its belly”). Sweeping blues and grays emphasize the vastness of the water keeping the friends apart, making their eventual reunion especially tender. Ages 2–5. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

A penguin’s journey to reunite with his friend supplies the premise behind this understated and elegantly designed interactive introduction to antonyms. The use of large, well-integrated flaps creates a satisfying sense of motion as readers help Little Penguin travel through the green-blue water past bloblike ocean flora and a variety of fauna, flecked with grainy or marbled patterns... Sweeping blues and grays emphasize the vastness of the water keeping the friends apart, making their eventual reunion especially tender.
—Publishers Weekly

Little Penguin sets out on a preposition-rich swim to visit a friend on a distant iceberg. ... The visual rises and falls in Little Penguin's journey create a simple, soothing flow. A pleasing, low-key dip into the ocean of language as well as water.
—Kirkus Reviews

The digital artwork is dark and cool, with the texture of block prints and the clean lines of papercut.
—School Library Journal

From the Publisher

11/01/2014
PreS-Gr 1—Little Penguin sets out to visit his friend on a faraway iceberg, traveling high and low, in front and behind, above and below undersea structures and creatures. The lift-the-flap format reveals the second half of all of the conceptual pairings, some smoothly, others awkwardly impeding the flow of the page-turning, especially a vertical flap that crosses the gutter. The digital artwork is dark and cool, with the texture of block prints and the clean lines of papercut. The story line is minimal and the book mainly functions as an exercise in opposites and directional concepts. An additional purchase.—Heidi Estrin, Congregation B'nai Israel, Boca Raton, FL

School Library Journal

2014-09-14
Little Penguin sets out on a preposition-rich swim to visit a friend on a distant iceberg. Opposites on different sides of glued-in flaps keep the action going. First jumping "high into the air…" Little Penguin then dives "low beneath the waves" to glide past seaweed, through a tunnel, "in front of playful dolphins… / then behind solemn sharks." Teckentrup mixes in occasional contrasting pairs of adjectives—"Feeling lonely made [Little Penguin's waiting friend] sad, but… / seeing Little Penguin made her happy!"—and other parts of speech on the way to a culminating "They were together at last!" The digital art is done with a limited palette of dimly lit colors in a flat, posterlike style, with penguins and other sea life rendered to look like monoprints or cut-paper collage. The flaps, which range from palm-sized squares to full-page or larger scenes with cutout peepholes, are placed so that the long curves of waves, fish and icy slopes continue uninterrupted no matter which side is up. The visual rises and falls in Little Penguin's journey create a simple, soothing flow. A pleasing, low-key dip into the ocean of language as well as water. (Picture book. 4-6)

Kirkus Reviews