Do You Want To Play? - Hardcover

Kolar's (Stomp! Stomp!) pleasantly dizzying volume is a variety show of common-sense advice on friendship. In spreads crowded with collage details and sprinkled with words and phrases, he touts fun ways to meet new people at a party or on a playground; the pictures favor theme over plot and brim with activity. Every spread centers on an Ernie-and-Bert-style duo who wander together through the boisterous "Friendship Park." All around them, kindly greetings and corny jokes help strangers break the ice. In one dynamic scene, the central characters attend a potluck concert that includes a sax-playing flower, a horn-blowing potato and a cymbal-clashing cat, among a multitude of others. This compositionAconstructed of gouache, tissue, cutout map-scraps and printed paperAalso features multiple typefaces that spell out the bangs, honks and ratta-tats of numerous instruments. "Sometimes we disagree, and then things really get out of tune," observes a bystander, providing transition to a section on fights and name-calling, apologies and forgiveness. (Sample exchange: "Still pals?" "I guess so.") The volume's center spread is a board game that rewards considerate acts and criticizes unfriendliness ("Make fun of someone: Move back 3"). This optimistic, lively book is too big and too busy for just one sitting and, in keeping with its theme, is ideal when shared among two or more readers at a time. Ages 5-8. (May)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Where Dave Ross's and Laura Rader's A Book of Friends (p. 537) faltered, Kolar's big, gregarious book succeeds; it's the ideal size for covering the giant topic of friendship. The pages are rife with drawings, while the text is a collage of tips, captions, and declarations. The spreads show a pageant of the things friends do: bike-riding, dancing, sending messages, and playing musical instruments. The downside of friendship shows up, too, for fights break out and sometimes people just need to be alone. Such general concepts are the playground for Kolar's parade of silly pictures. ``Check me out!'' says a checker board, doffing his hat, while on another page a flower explains, ``My friends picked me.'' The endpapers are alive with stick people, juggling, sweeping, and eating gigantic ice cream cones. A board game breaks up the text by contributing concepts about friendship, e.g., ``Stick out your tongue at someone/Lose a turn,'' while a separate tale within the pages offers children a mini-storytime. The book is so bright and full of drolleries that children may pore over it for hours, and will return to these pages often. (Picture book. 5-8) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.