Books

Fall into a story.

It’s a dreary, wintry day, and Alice is tired of it and of being inside. But a book catches her attention. “Once upon a time, there was a girl,” it reads. The characters invite her in: “Turn the page and come in….” And in Alice goes, traveling through worlds before eventually returning home. Lin and Messner’s spectacular collaboration celebrates books and reading. Repeated refrains and elements in plot structure make for a rhythmic read-aloud that builds deftly to a heartwarming conclusion. Lin’s signature illustrations, done in gouache, are filled with detail. Full-bleed, double-page spreads as well as close-up, overhead illustrations of the book held by Alice’s hands will immerse readers in the storytelling alongside the protagonist. Lin plays with style to signal the narrative progression. Alice wears a dress made of text-filled book pages, signaling that she’s a child of stories, that transforms into the background of each place she becomes a part of—from the green of jungles and the tan of deserts to the blue, gray, and black of the sky. To similar effect, when Alice turns the page and learns about a new place, the setting is flatter in dimension and simpler, but when she enters it, textures, light, shadows, and more flourish.Details in decor cue Alice and her family as being of Chinese or Taiwanese heritage. (This book was reviewed digitally.) A spellbinding ode to imagination and the transformative wonder of stories.—Kirkus (starred review)

In this vibrant celebration of reading, young Alice is tired of being cooped up at home on a dreary winter day and finds herself swept into the pages of a storybook for a grand adventure. The book takes her from a lush tropical rainforest to a deep-sea dive to an expansive moonlit sky. Though each setting is wondrously tantalizing, none is exactly right, and Alice ends up back home with her parents just in time for a cozy dinner. Lin and Messner’s inspired collaboration pays homage to classic children’s literature with visual references to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and narrative themes evoking Where the Wild Things Are while simultaneously delivering an experience that is fresh and new. Richly detailed illustrations play with perspective and offer clever recurring motifs to delight readers each time they revisit the story. Alice’s journey into and out of a book captures the very essence of what it means to be a reader, reveling in the thrill of exploration, the power of imagination, and the comforting familiarity of home. This title shines as a positive representation of Asian-American culture:Alice and her parents are depicted as Asian-American, and their home decor incorporates Asian folklore and traditions such as the moon rabbit and a Lunar New Year decoration on the front door. VERDICT A first purchase for picture book collections, this title will be a hit at story hours and for and classroom read-alouds, as well as a treasure for book lovers of all ages.—School Library Journal (starred review)

“It’s wet and cold outside. Alice is tired of being bundled up in clothes, so, in protest, she digs a sleeveless dress out of a drawer and wishes she could be somewhere sunny. As if on command, the pages of a book flutter. The next illustration shows Alice’s hands holding the book, and she is now inside of it! Her dress is covered in words, as if made from a book itself. The birds on the page invite her to visit. As she joins them, her dress takes on the lush-green color of the background. Moving through the pages, her clothes change to orange for the camels’ desert and turquoise in the fishes’ underwater home. Intricate illustrations, painted in vibrant gouache, convey each location in a new color palette. A small rabbit is tucked into each illustration, inviting children to seek and find. Alice enjoys exploring, but on each page something is not quite right—it’s either too wet, dusty, cold, lonely, and so on. When she finds a page showing a cozy kitchen, she realizes it looks like home. Dumplings are ready for dinner, and Alice happily rejoins her family. Perhaps in homage to other notable children’s books, this Alice’s adventure takes readers through an imaginative wonderland and gets them home in time for a Sendakian supper, which is still hot.” —Booklist (starred review)

“Cold sleet is falling, and the protagonist of this home-and-back-again
adventure tale, Alice, is stuck inside, bored. Then she spots a book on
the floor and starts to read: “Once upon a time, there was a girl…She
went to a place alive with colors, where even the morning dew was
warm.” “That sounds like our home,” says one of the book’s
characters (a flamingo), who invites the child into the book. She climbs in and spends time with the animal characters. When it starts to rain, she wishes to be elsewhere, and the camels in the desert on
the next spread of the book (one she’s both inhabiting and holding in her hands) invite her to join them: “Turn the page and come in.” And
so it goes, the girl on a thrilling journey of the imagination, swimming through a coral reef, floating in space, and much more. At
home, Alice has a plush rabbit and rabbit-shaped slippers, but a real (and vigilant) rabbit accompanies her on her journey; readers can seek-and-find it on every spread. The text builds patterns and a pleasing rhythm with repeating sentence structures; children will delight in anticipating what comes next. Lin’s lush full-bleed spreads invite readers to take the journey with Alice, whose dress changes color in each environment, making her blend into every one of the worlds. That Alice is an Asian girl says much about the authors’ wishes for all children to see themselves in the books they read—in this case, quite literally.” —Horn Book (starred review)

“In this meta collaboration by Lin (A Big Mooncake for Little Star) and Messner (Only the Best), immersive gouache spreads convey the way books can carry readers into new worlds. Stranded inside by winter weather, Alice, who wears pink glasses, rummages through a drawer for a favorite sleeveless dress—it’s covered with print words—then spies a book on the floor and, curious, begins to read. “Once upon a time, there was a girl… She went to a place alive with colors, where even the morning dew was warm.” A flamingo and other tropical birds break the book’s fourth wall to beckon Alice into its pages, and she climbs right in. Now tiny amid riotous tropical growth in a dress that takes on the green of the page’s background, she’s seen perched on a tree limb, part of a brilliant tapestry of forest birdlife. As the pages turn, Alice, tiring of each setting’s environs, travels by book with a rabbit companion. From desert to ocean to sky to the black void of space, her dress blends magically and invisibly into each background, until a new desire—companionship—sees her turning home to a celebratory meal. It’s a warm, Sendakian view of books’ cinematic and transportive powers that ends with a “place of coziness and warmth.” Context cues suggest Chinese or Taiwanese heritage for Alice’s family.”  —Publishers Weekly

• NEIBA Long list
• 2024 MA Book Award for Picture books
• A Kirkus Best Picture Book of 2023
• A Smithsonian Magazine Best Kids Books of 2023
• 2024 CCBC Choice List