COLORS

One of four “Animagicals” imports (Music, On The Go, and Patterns), this stumbles along in the footsteps of Beatrice Schenck De Regniers’s It Does Not Say Meow (1972), illustrated by Paul Galdone, and the like, matching a dozen riddle rhymes aimed at readers just past primary level with animal answers partially concealed behind gatefolds. Each animal is tied to a color, most of which make sense once uncovered. But though Junakovic’s colorful, vigorously brushed figures look up from the tall page with an appealing range of expressions, for the most part the verbal clues are too vague (some don’t even rhyme with the clue), and the visible portions of the illustrations too amorphous, for children to take more than blind stabs at the solutions. Better color books abound—this one’s game is off. Inessential. (Picture book. 5-7)