posted on 23 Nov 2017

Little Hazelnut by Anne-Florence Lemasson and Dominique Ehrhard

I have quite a big collection of pop books, some of which are astounding because of their engineering complexity. This one is relatively small in size with usually just one pop up featured on each page but is nevertheless breathtaking because of its quiet simplicity.

The front and back covers show a snowy scene with a little blue tit in the foreground, the hazelnut in the middle on the spine and half of a black cat padding in from the left hand corner. The fact that he is just a shape with no features makes him even more menacing. The first page is completely white and so is the facing page apart from the window frame through which the snowflakes are falling plus just one line of text. This has the effect of  seeming to muffle sound in the way that is sometimes experienced with the first fall of snow – very clever.

On the turn of the page we have the first impressive pop up showing a red squirrel holding a nut standing on green grass which is rapidly being covered by textured circles to represent the snow.  Then we see that the nut drops down into a hole and a passing little white mouse scampers away to find ‘a warm hiding place’. The next page is my favourite one with the blanket of snow now covering everything and the blue tit standing in contrast as she pecks around for something to eat.

The next page turn is very dramatic with three black crows now standing starkly against the white background:

She won’t come back

The crows have frightened her away.

In the cold deep winter,

They are masters of the deserted garden.

When the featureless cat appears striding across the next pages, the birds fly away with just their many footprints left behind. Thankfully there is no bloodshed involved as the colour red would have definitely spoilt the overall gentleness of the book. The next pages are wordless as we see the little green shoot pushing through the rapidly melting snow and the final pages show the sapling tree now in leaf and growing in a green field of white daisies.

This is a beautiful picture book where the simple text and stylised pop up illustrations in muted colours work well together to tell this life cycle story about a tree with some references to hibernation and the seasons. The hazelnut is the most important character but its ultimate success and survival depends heavily on the right environment and co- existence with other creatures.  As with all the best picture books, the spaces between the turn of the pages and the hints about what is not included are as important as what is explicitly told. This one is impressively modest and will sit proudly alongside the more flamboyant ones in my collection. 

Karen Argent

November 2017