The Numberlys

K-Gr 3—In this large, mostly vertical picture book, the numberlys are tiny folks living in a black-and-white futuristic metropolis. Its buildings appear especially tall as the pages here often rotate the layout—readers must move the book a quarter turn so that the left-hand side tops a view spilling down the double page. The spare text and many wordless pages tell of a time when there were only numbers and no alphabet: "Everyone liked numbers. They had nice shapes and kept things in order. And everything added up…So life was sort of…numberly." Long, tidy rows of the little inhabitants, whose head antennae gives them an extraterrestrial appearance, include five friends who are unhappy with the sameness. This is a world where "there weren't any books or colors or jellybeans or pizza." But the friends want MORE, and in wordless spreads, they get to work, marching down long stairs among giant cogs and gears. As they struggle with the machinery lines, ad shapes tumble out. "At first it was awful. Then…artful…" As the falling bits shape into letters of the alphabet, they also take on color, and soon the world has pizza, jellybeans, and names for people. The varied layouts can be a bit confusing and the tone rather static, but there are comic moments and a provocative premise about the value of letters and words. The jacket flap invites readers "to "see this book come to life through the augmented reality app." Readers/viewers able to manipulate those machines on screen and help those little people crank out letters are likely to enjoy the lesson of recognizing and naming them. The numbers vs. alphabet concept seems sophisticated for young picture book readers, but teachers and librarians might find useful opportunities for discussion or by pairing this with other alphabet books.—Margaret Bush, Simmons College, Boston