Up, Tall, and High! (review)
Buy Issue for $25 at JHUP- Up, Tall, and High!
Friendly one-upmanship unifies these three tiny tales of a flock of bird buddies. "I Am Tall" centers on boasting about stature: a tall bird and a taller one compare heights, but when the smallest bird joins in with a failed ruse (those stilts don't fool anyone), he spreads his plumage and earns his props. "I Can Go High" finds the birds outdoing each other on altitude attempts; they good-naturedly take pity on a flightless penguin and send him airborne with a bunch of helium balloons. [End Page 311] In "I Am Up," two birds "up" in a nest collapse the branch and are now decidedly "down," until their friends arrive to help them "up" on their feet again. Long's avian crew are composed of simplified cartoon shapes heavily outlined in black, with the gumdrop palette and sweeping lines of a restrained Chris Raschka and the googly eyes of Mo Willems' pigeon. The brevity and razor-sharp trajectory of the stories are well tuned to the youngest listeners, while the tightly controlled vocabulary invites newbie readers. As an added bonus, each tale's punchline is delivered with a visual gag revealed with a lifted or pulled flap. Where can preschoolers turn when they've run through Willems' Elephant and Piggie titles? Here.
