Ten Purim Bears: A Counting Book

Toddler-PreS–Counting books do not need detailed storylines to do their job—just take readers from one to 10, please!—but there are ways, either through dynamic illustrations or clever formatting innovations, to make them feel fresh and interesting. Atlas and Horvath, who previously collaborated on Once a Bear, depict a group of bears sitting in chairs. The costumed friends have gathered to share hamantaschen and watch a play for the Jewish holiday of Purim. While the book performs its function well enough, the uneven meter of its rhyme and the oddly proportioned, flat illustrations make it a hard sell for toddlers. The most successful feature is its colorful border, which welcomes each bear and clearly shows readers the new count with both the numerical symbol and numbers spelled out. But there are other titles on the market about the holiday with an abundance of shelf appeal, and even more titles that successfully use the counting book format to connect to Jewish culture and religious traditions.