After teaching the very young about "high and low" and "near and far" in The Happy Little Yellow Box: A Book of Opposites, which marked the debut of the star of this series, the Happy Little Yellow Box, David Carter now takes youngest readers from A to Z.
Once again, the predominantly black-and-white palette emulates a chalkboard, thick white lines on a black backdrop, making the high contrast easy for youngest eyes to decipher. The golden box and a touch of red here and there draw readers' attention where it needs to be. Each letter gets an uppercase and lowercase treatment. "Aa is for an apple and 5 ants," the book begins; the stem of the apple curves toward the quintet of insects. "Bb" is, of course, for box, "The Happy Little Yellow Box!," which pops up from the middle of the first two-page spread. Next is a caterpillar crawling, and then Dd introduces the first of the interactive elements: "a dog behind a door." When children discover the door (on the yellow box), they open it to find the promised pooch. At least one interactive element appears on every spread, including flaps, pull tabs (a standout: when the Happy Little Yellow Box takes a "joyful jump" for Jj), and even a rotating wheel that makes a meteor appear over the moon.
David Carter takes no shortcuts for Zz. "Zoom goes the Happy Little Yellow Box," and a pull tab sends the yellow fellow skyward, as if sailing out of the book and into--we hope--the next adventure. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness