LOOK WHAT I FOUND IN THE WOODS

Three children explore and collect things from the forest floor in this multitasking picture book.

Part story, part seek-and-find, part nonfiction nature book, this adventure begins as three friends, two White and one Black, enter the woods wearing backpacks, dog running along ahead. On the opening spread, a rhyming couplet at the top invites readers to follow a child narrator into the woods (I and we are used throughout, and both work). Two additional lines declare, “Look what I found! / A curly stick that looks like a magic wand.” An insert in the bottom-right-hand corner asks readers to also find one signpost, two butterflies, and three flowers. On the second spread, facts about the shapes of trees are placed throughout the illustration, and a full sidebar shows and labels tree shapes to find. The spreads continue to alternate between these layouts as the children make their way through the woods, finding different “treasures” along the way. At the end of their walk, they have a table full of finds, and the rear endpapers show adorable craft creations composed of objects from the woods, with a reminder to only take treasures from the ground. The book’s detailed, varied illustrations and useful information for beginners invite readers to linger over the pages and to use the book as a companion in the natural world. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10.6-by-19.6-inch double-page spreads viewed at 87.9% of actual size.)

A versatile and irresistible invitation to explore the outdoors.