From: Denise I. Matulka <dimatulka>
Date: Sun, 27 Jan 2002 12:25:58 +0800

Hello:

"The Stray Dog" was my pick for winner, so I am not surprised that it was an honor title. I was instantly drawn to the color palette: the muted colors suited the spring/summer setting. Green was used liberally throughout the illustrations, and so indicative of those seasons and a park setting. I think Simont did a wonderful job of balancing white space with full page illustration. The use of vignette (spot) illustrations was reminiscent of older picture books, such as Curious George and Babar.

Such a simple story could have been interpreted a hundred other ways. Simont's playful yet serious pictures elevated the simple text, bringing an overall sense of warmth to the book as a whole.

Denise

Denise I. Matulka Graduate School of Library and Information Sciences University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign dimatulka at alltel.net matulka at uiuc.edu
(217) 332F22 Imaginary Lands: Promoting Children's Literature http://imaginarylands.org
Received on Sat 26 Jan 2002 10:25:58 PM CST