Awake Beautiful Child by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Gracia Lam
Awake Beautiful Child written by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Gracia Lam
Alphabet picture book published by McSweeny’s
In this fascinating picture book, Amy Krouse Rosenthal uses only words that begin with A, B or C to tell her story. The day begins as a young boy awakens and enjoys Apples, Bananas and Cantaloupe for breakfast before heading outside and finding Ants, Butterflies and Caterpillars. He later celebrates at a birthday party, explores a city and appreciates an artist. Older children will enjoy scouring debut picture book illustrator Gracia Lam’s detailed digital illustrations for an apron, bowling pins, binoculars, a castle, a cape, a church (and more!) that serve to broaden the appeal of the story and support the development of phonemic awareness and alphabet recognition.
It is worth mentioning that Ms. Rosenthal and Ms. Lam do not limit the story or illustrations to the phoneme /K/, they also challenge readers to recognize the use of ‘C’ in words beginning with the /ch/ and soft ‘C’ sounds, as in church and city. the ‘A’ words that we detected use the short vowel sound.
We envision this picture book as a wonderful inspiration to young illustrators and writers. Great for classroom use, the clever take on the alphabet book genre could certainly be a jumping off point for children to create their own stories and illustrations using only two or three letters.
This is a picture book that will be enjoyed by children aged 3 and up but that has great potential for exciting older children and adults.
The creative Amy Krouse Rosenthal’s latest offering is a unique alphabet book, telling the story of a child’s day in three-word ABC phrases, from “Awake Beautiful Child” to “Arranging Blankets, Cozy.” (I particularly like “Always Be Curious.”) Older kids will enjoy the author’s invitation to find secret ABC objects throughout Gracia Lam’s artwork (“what do you see on the boy’s bedroom floor that starts with the letter B?”), and to submit their own ABC phrase and accompanying drawing.
is undoubtedly the gorgeous graphic illustrations by Gracia Lam, which owe some debt to the great Paul Rand and his brethren. Muted colours, clean lines and a great feeling of movement give the pictures a real sense of whimsy. Unfortunately, the text, by the normally reliable Amy Krouse Rosenthal (her