Where, oh where is Robot's arm? His wee robot friend (think squashed R2-D2) is ever so helpful, looking all through the house, up a tree, at an aquarium for the missing limb, but alas, it's "nowhere to be found." He resorts to offering alternatives but "[n]o, a broom won't make a good arm. Neither will a pencil. Neither will scissors. And an umbrella certainly won't do." The diligent bot-pal tries--and discards--every possible option in every locale, including a library, a candy store ("Shall we look in here? Sweet!") and even a robot factory, ultimately deciding that "[m]aybe a fork is not such a bad arm after all."
Young readers accustomed to I Spy and Where's Waldo? will pore over the intricately detailed black-on-cream cut-paper illustrations, searching for the lost arm, but it's not until the final page that they will be rewarded with a sighting--wouldn't you know it, even robo-dogs are rascally when it comes to carrying off appealing looking objects!
Striking geometric silhouetted images invite long, happy perusal (gears and wind-up keys abound) while opposing pages offer pleasing muted blues, greens and peaches, against which the simple, playful text stands out nicely: "It isn't in the amusement park, but will this lollipop do?"
Chihiro Takeuchi is a well-known cut-paper artist in Osaka, Japan. Can You Find My Robot's Arm? is her debut English-language picture book, although she has written and illustrated several books in Japanese. Readers will surely be asking librarians, "Can you find more books by Chihiro Takeuchi?" --Emilie Coulter, freelance writer and editor