Like other books in Marzollo's I Spy series, this one features a simple rhyming text and crystal-clear color photographs of common objects. Readers will have to be eagle-eyed (not to mention diligent) to locate the bright toys, games, party favors, sports equipment, and other childhood items that hide in blue shadows, on a shell-filled beach, behind keyholes, and in a whimsical nursery painting. Filled with props, the diverse and imaginative sets (their construction is explained in a note) should inspire kids to invent their own mysteries and rhymes. Librarians should be forewarned that patrons may be tempted to mark up the pages, but this is still a book to recommend to young detectives sick of looking for that little guy in the red-and-white stripped shirt and the red hat. (Reviewed Nov. 15, 1993)

With its intriguing theme, the fourth picture-riddle title contains bewitching color photographs, teeming with sundry objects that participants must discover upon reading the rhymed text. The alluring photographs overwhelm the contrived, mundane verse; the interplay of pictures and words lacks the strength needed to sustain repeated readings.