I DIG

A beach book for new readers.

The front-cover art shows a brown-haired boy with peachy skin and dark eyes gazing at readers while holding a shovel. He’s up to his armpits in a hole in the sand while a dog and a crab dig in the background. The back cover depicts the same boy in red-and-green swimming trunks looking at the sea beside another, bigger boy who shares his coloring but wears blue trunks. The two seem like brothers, and the older boy smiles encouragingly when the younger one says, “Look” on three successive pages as a shovel is borne into shore on the crest of a big wave. “I dig,” says the little boy on the next page, and he tunnels into the sand, finding: seashells (depicted in the art but not named in the appropriately controlled text); “a crab”; and “stars” (starfish in a watery pool that appears in the tunnel); and then “a dog,” which he follows “up” again to the beach’s sandy surface, where his brother awaits. The tunneling brings a touch of fantasy to the story, and whimsy arrives with the night’s sky and more “stars” spied by the boys—this time twinkling above. Both starry moments, as well as the energetic line that characterizes Cepeda’s technique in rendering backgrounds and figures alike, lend vitality to this simple story.

Kids will dig it.