Using the same format as her stunning Hidden Alphabet (2003), Seeger presents readers with another eye-catching concept book. Pictured in a die-cut square is a black bat against a white background: “black?” Lift the full-page flap to see a goofily grinning ghost, the bat transmogrified into its mouth: “white!” Some 17 oppositional pairs follow, some simple—“day? night!”—some significantly more complicated—“addition? subtraction!” and, well, “simple? complicated!” (This latter features the word “simple” in blocky letters that become twists and dead-ends in a massively complex maze.) The very best pairings feature pictures that become graphical elements in its opposite; thus, a flea (“tiny?”) becomes an elephant’s eye (“huge!”), and a frowny face (“sad?”) becomes a smiling, freckled, snub-nosed face (“happy!”). With its mix of basic and more sophisticated contradictions, this volume will appeal to a relatively broad spectrum of ages, gently leading the youngest readers from the obvious to the more complex and rewarding older readers with its graphical cleverness. From beginning to end, another winner from Seeger. (Picture book. 3-7)
