(Preschool) This ingenious picture book invites the very young to rethink absolutes. ""Pink is for crow..."" the book begins, confoundingly, accompanied by a picture of a sleek black bird. A turn of the page reveals the explanation -- ""when it has just hatched from its egg"" -- and a painting shows featherless pink baby birds, open-mouthed in their nest. ""Yellow is for pine tree..."" shows a standard green tree; when the page is turned, we see piles of yellow planks in a lumberyard. ""It all depends on when we look...how near or far...outside or in,"" Shannon concludes. Though the concept is a stretch for preschoolers, the book will reward their attention, and Dronzek's acrylic illustrations are rich, vibrant, and full of child appeal -- kids will wish they could jump right into them. Both text and pictures are supported by a seamless, elegant, and clever design. The colors are presented in seemingly random order, but in fact there is a pattern: after establishing that an item is not always the color we automatically assign it, the book follows with that color (so ""black"" follows crow, ""red"" follows poppy); boldly striped endpapers reinforce the pattern. As the book closes with ""Orange is for sky...when the sun has nearly set,"" the baby birds of the opening spread are sleeping, providing a traditional, comforting shape to a distinctly unconventional book. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.

For children ready to step past the primal "apples are red, leaves are green" stage of color coding, Shannon and Dronzek offer helping hands: "PINK is for crow . . . [turn the page] when it has just hatched from its egg. BLACK is for poppy . . . when we take the time to look inside," and so on. The acrylic art underscores each observation in deep, rich hues; viewers can look down into a poppy's dark center, glimpse a bear cub sniffing at white, unripe blueberries and observe the difference between a whole red apple and a cut one. Some of Shannon's phrasing seems contorted--"Purple is for snow . . . when the snow is the shadow of us," for instance, or "Yellow is for pine tree . . . when the tree has been cut and sawed to build," accompanying a view of a lumberyard. Nevertheless, his insight will leave many young children regarding their world in a new way: "It all depends on when we look . . . how near or far . . . outside or in." (Picture book. 3-6) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

PreS-Gr 2-If Georgia O'Keeffe had made a book for young children, it might have looked like this one. Close-ups of natural phenomenon in a vibrant palette combine with strategic pacing to undo the viewer's preconceptions about color. This creative duo has selected 10 images with which to stage their drama. The minimalist text appears in black ink, except for the words that name the colors; they are enlarged and color-coordinated. Thus, the opening page depicts a black crow, but the text reads, "Pink is for crow-." The page turn reveals a spread showing a nest of newborn birds and the conclusion: "-when it has just hatched from its egg." In like manner, author and artist pair purple and snow, blue and firelight, yellow and pine trees. The disconnect between the written hue and the initial object, combined with the elliptical construction, allows older children to guess and predict the outcomes and younger ones to be surprised. The bold, uncluttered scenes, rendered in acrylics, have a sweetness and strength that is quite pleasing to the eye. Easy to read and fun to share, this paean to the wonder of cycles and the rewards of close observation is the perfect prelude to a thoughtful excursion. Fans of Shannon and Dronzek would also enjoy titles such as Tana Hoban's Look! Look! Look! (HarperCollins, 1988; o.p.) and N. N. Charles's What Am I? Looking Through Shapes at Apples and Grapes (Scholastic, 1994).-Wendy Lukehart, Washington DC Public Library (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

PreS-K. Shannon challenges color associations that become ingrained in early life by using unusual combinations of words and images: "Pink is for crow," reads the text, which is illustrated with a painting of a glossy black bird. An explanation comes on the following spread: "When it has just hatched from its egg," accompanied by a picture of featherless pink nestlings. Subsequent spreads follow a similar pattern of contradiction and explanation: red poppies, for example, are black "when we take the time to look inside." The text is sometimes awkward: purple represents snow "when the snow is the shadow of us." But the rich hues and solid, uncomplicated shapes in the thickly brushed acrylic paintings extend the sense of visual delight and the mystery in the words. The format invites children to look with the eyes of an artist or a scientist, question preconceptions, and closely examine the actual world, where blueberries are, indeed, sometimes white. --Gillian Engberg Copyright 2005 Booklist