Books 3 : Now you see me

Book name : Now you See me
Author : Tish Rabe
Illustrated by : Christopher Moroney

What is the book all about (taken from Goodreads)

Hide-and-seek is a great game, but Nick always finds where Sally is hiding. And that’s no fun! Enter the Cat in the Hat. His friend Gecko is an expert at hiding. Maybe Gecko can share some tips with the kids? So off they go to the jungle, where Gecko teaches them how to hide in plain sight—using camouflage! Kids won’t be able to hide their delight in this rhymed Step 2,Step into Reading book based on an episode from the new PBS Kids television show The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That! (Step 2 is for children who recognize familiar words and sound out new words with aural and visual cues. Step 2 titles have simple stories, basic vocabulary, and short sentences.) (less)

Our thoughts

I never read Dr. Seuss books when I was a child , and had always wondered what the fuss was all about. I am not sure if this is part of the original Dr Seuss books , but it  has a lovely cover with ‘The Cat’, which made me pick  it up at the library . This book is supposedly for  level 2  readers( those who can recognize familiar sounds and words), but I don’t really believe in the theory that kids must be exposed to books that are prescribed for their age. I plan on reading out random books to Beanie , just to expose her to stuff that are available.  It is upto her to like or dislike stuff and make her own opinions. If she understands what I read out , great. If she doesn’t, no sweat. Someday she will.  I didn’t know a think about Wodehouse when I started reading his books in my tenth standard holidays, but till date Wodehouse is one of my favourite. I wouldn’t have discovered a great writer if I had thought about age-appropriateness and stayed away from that book.  Anyway reading this book to Beanie was just an experiment to see if she could understand books with slightly complicated concepts.

 Both of us enjoyed the book (Me more than her, I guess)  and we are sure this is just the beginning of our journey into other ‘Cat in the Hat’ books’. The book is rather adorable and starts of with Sally and Nick starting their vacation. They play a game of hide-and-seek  , in which Nick has to find Sally.As expected, Nick is able to spot Sally out in a minute. In comes The Cat and tells them all about ‘CAMOUFLAGE’.  Beanie didn’t know the word ,but kept repeating it over and over again. Some words are lovely like that, no?

The Cat takes the duo into the jungle to meet Gecko to teach them all about Camouflage and hiding. I thought that the concept was rather clever , and would definitely work with slightly older kids. For some reason , Beanie couldn’t correlate the connection between the Gecko hiding and the kids playing hide-and-seek. I am sure this would be a great book for a four or a five year old.

Illustrations are  bright and lovely. I am sure there is some back story to why The Cat is in black and white, whereas other characters are in colour. I also loved the lyrical quality of the words that seemed just apt and not trite( I have read books where  really stupid-sounding sentences are strung up just for the sake of rhyming with the previous sentence!).  Beanie can’t appreciate rhyming stuff yet. She loves action words ,though. Also , I have noticed that she likes books that have girls as main characters rather than the ones with boys ( case in point is the Barbie series, which also happens to be her favorite.) I am just hoping that she will grow out of her pink-princess-Barbie fixation soon 🙂

 Overall , a lovely read with a super concept.

Image Courtesy Apple

Our Verdict:

Bedazzled : High five! Will definitely read the book again to beanie when she is a little older.

Beanie : “CAMOUFLAGGGGEEEE”