The Nowhere Box by Sam Zuppardi (review)

George’s younger brothers just won’t leave him alone, so he shouts that he’s going “nowhere! And you can’t follow me!” before taking off. He discovers that the giant cardboard box from a recently delivered washing machine is just the trick to take him Nowhere—an empty space where the box can become a roller coaster, rocket ship, and all kinds of other nifty, imaginative things. After a bit, though, George realizes that Nowhere is a somewhat lonely place and decides to head back to play with his younger siblings. George’s plight will be familiar to kids dealing with exasperating brothers and sisters or a budding sense of introversion, and his isolationist escapism is treated both gently and enthusiastically. Zuppardi’s untidy illustrations in acrylic and pencil are kid-inspired with their scratchy, repeated outlines and thick, unevenly applied coloration; cardboard is used in the presentation of George’s imagined worlds in Nowhere, giving the pictures a rough, three-dimensional whimsy and providing a clever nod to the box itself. George—whose red striped shirt and boxy imagination are reminiscent of Watterson’s Calvin of Calvin and Hobbes in iconicity if not in nature—and his brothers are little more than glorified stick figures with huge heads, yet they are strikingly expressive with just a few facial details. Bound to appeal to a wide range of kids because of its celebration of both collaborative and solitary play, this could be used in a storytime about siblings or imagination—or, when paired with a title like McCarty’s Chloe (BCCB 9/12) and some sizable cardboard, an introduction to the fun that can be had with boxes.