Heavily outlined jewel-toned watercolors emulate stained glass in this stunning retelling of the familiar tale. The retelling itself is quite lengthy, occupying several tight-packed side folios; this serves both to slow readers down enough to admire the pop-up artistry and to provide additional opportunities for small, turn-activated pop-ups. Often there’s more magic in these smaller elements than the central tableaux: Readers can peer through telescoping windows into the castle as Beauty’s father explores; Beauty inches around a door as she discovers her new home; the Beast undergoes the transformation back to a man. By complementing rather than overpowering the story, Sabuda creates a nearly perfect pop-up adaptation—a rare feat for a technology that too often subordinates book to ostentatious razzle-dazzle. (Pop-up fairy tale. 5-8)
