Maisy Big, Maisy Small

One of the boldest, most visually challenging Maisy books, this volume vibrates with the usual barrage of bright, bold, primary colors, but also has a lot of kooky, creative artwork, and a decidedly surrealistic tone. The images are blown up to fill the pages, practically spilling out of the book while overloading the reader's senses. Illustrating over two dozen opposite concepts, this book takes great liberties with Maisy's visual appearance -- when Maisy flies, she has her own wings; when she swims, Maisy has a mermaid tail. For thin vs. thick, her body elongates and then compacts; for fluffy vs. spiky, first her edges soften and then she looks like she just stuck a fork in an electrical outlet. Strictly speaking, not all the concepts are opposites (swimming/flying, for example) but the book's blithe, puckish spirit will sweep away such quibbles. This is a very lively, visually stimulating picturebook, taking Lucy Cousin's cartoonist art style and pushing it in new directions. It's pretty cool... a great book for the littlest readers. (ReadThatAgain book reviews)

"Maisy Big, Maisy Small" is a large, bright concepts book of opposites, bursting with visual interest and fun! The idea of this book is very simple. On the left page, a concept is presented such as "Maisy fluffy." On the right is this opposite, in this case, "Maisy spiky." It's the book's amazing illustrations that bring it to life. Despite their seemingly (deceptively so) style, they burst with excitement and interest. One of the best is "Maisy happy" and "Maisy sad." The left page is a very happy Maisy against a background of an explosion of bright colors, hearts and other symbols, while the left is a sad Maisy against a gray background. On the book jacket, Cousins comments that she "had so much fun painting Maisy in ways I'd never seen her before." Overall, this is a great success and all fans of Maisy will enjoy seeing her in these new and exciting ways.

Maisy is the best character ever developed for young children. From the DVDs to the board books to the pull-out books, my 2 y.o. can't get enough of Maisy. We found Maisy on a trip to Slovenia in 2003 (known as Minka), and we were overjoyed to find her here at home in the US. MAISY BIG MAISY SMALL doesn't disappoint. It is a large, colorful, simple to understand and enjoyable book. It presents opposites ("Maisy tall....Maisy short", etc.) - with Maisy as the main character and her friends joining in. The only reason I didn't add a fifth star is that my little one LOVES the pull-tab books of Maisy, so her interest was lost in the book a little sooner than with other Maisy books (of course, this was after reading it every night for more than two weeks and then sporadically after that). Again, it is a large lap book. The colors are invigorating. The scenes are delightful. Not much reading required. Older infants and toddlers will most certainly gravitate to this book because of its color, and fun and simply-drawn characters.