OCEAN

Lift the flaps to help marine life
parents find their babies.

For better or worse, there’s plenty
going on in this board book. Each die-cut page grows progressively taller, with
variously shaped waves, boats, and rocks jutting out of the top, creating a
three-dimensional appearance. It’s a swell look, but those little edges sticking
up bend and shred when handled, significantly shortening the book’s life span,
especially when combined with the flimsy binding. Inside, readers lift
(thankfully more robust) flaps to locate the baby animals. Rendered in an
eye-catching but somewhat disquieting palette of blood-red, navy, teal, and
pale chartreuse, the angular, heavily layered backgrounds with extensive
shading capture a feeling of the water’s depth. The marine life is equally
idiosyncratic, with evocatively stylized bodies that are more striking than
traditionally adorable. Though the sea creatures have those friendly faces and
wide eyes that so often denote picture-book cuteness, there are too many sharp
angles and toothy mouths to see them as sweet, with the exception of a
perfectly cradled baby otter. Conveyed in a perfunctory rhyme that starts on
the page and finishes inside the flaps, the uninspired verse scans but reads
aloud as choppily as the waves atop the pages. Companion title Farm offers a bit more adorableness but
shares this title’s construction flaws.

The bookmaking quality underwhelms,
but the compelling, vivid art makes this one untraditional excursion under the
sea. (Board book. 1-3)