Red Again

A peaceful, wordless adventure that, as the final frames hint, will continue after it's closed.

K-Gr 3--Picking up exactly where The Red Book leaves off, the boy who finds the mysterious red book at the end of that story takes it home to examine it in this one. Wordless panels show him looking through the pages at the islands that fans of the first tale will recognize, zooming in until he sees a girl fishing in a boat and finding the red book in the water. When she opens the book, she finds pages revealing the boy in his room. Illustrating the power of a book to connect, she uses her intuition (and a baguette and a seagull) to find her way out of the narrative and to her new friend's door who, in his excitement, drops the red book. The smart, clean art with smooth bold lines offers so much to observe and puzzle through while telling the complex story effortlessly without the use of text. This title stands alone but pairing it with the first work makes it all the more magical, particularly because the end brings the story into a breathtaking circle. The final page showing a girl finding the lost red book in the snow is from the beginning of the previous volume, deepening the intrigue around the red book and its time sequence while providing many opportunities for discussion and creative thinking. VERDICT Whether being explored for pleasure or for academic purposes, this title will add value to any library collection, especially ones that have copies of its predecessor.--Julie Roach, Cambridge Public Library, MA

The Red Book, Lehman's Caldecott Honor-winning wordless picture book, imagined a red volume that connected two children across a great distance. On the final page of that story, a child on a bicycle finds the red book. Lehman's sequel starts at that moment. The boy races home with his treasure and opens it to a page with a map of islands; an image of a girl in a dinghy comes into view, as through a telescope. She has a red book, too; two consecutive images show them holding their books up delightedly with the image of the other child displayed in a kind of hall-of-mirrors moment. The girl sets out to meet the boy, and both drop their books on the way in their haste. One copy is picked up by the girl who starred in the first story. Is it an endless loop? Who will find the books next? Lehman gives readers the satisfaction of learning more about the original story while leaving them with more to ponder. Together, the two volumes form a pleasing and perplexing Mobius strip of a story. Ages 4-7. (Nov.)