Starred Review for Publishers Weekly

Among the fall's best pop-up books are two for adults as well as kids—in fact, some grown-ups might not want to let kids get their mitts anywhere near these ingeniously engineered beauties.

<REVIEW PUBLISHER=""Reed Business Information-US"" RELEASEDATE=""08/18/2008"" LANGUAGE=""EN"" SECRIGHTS=""YES"" PUBLICATION=""Publishers Weekly"" PUBDATE=""08/18/2008"" VOLUME=""255"" ISSUE=""33"" PAGE=""62"" SECTION=""Reviews"" SUBSECTION=""Children's Books"" CONTENTTYPE=""Review"" AUTHNAME=""Staff"" STARRED=""YES"">ABC3DMarion Bataille. Roaring Brook/Porter, $19.95 (36p) ISBN 978-1-59643-425-7

From the lenticular cover to the jazzy use of a red, white and black color scheme, this hand-size French alphabet book is as stylish as a pop-up can be. Letters here not only pop up, they move and transform. As the reader turns the page, the curves of the letter B slide out from a column thinly striped in red: they appear as narrowly spaced concentric arcs, creating an almost hypnotic effect. C flips over to become the curve of D; G goes from upright to prone—but then tricks the eye again; and on and on. Many letters are three-dimensional (i.e., the legs of H are hollow paper rectangles), and gain extra glamour from high-contrast backgrounds (white on black; red or black on white). A-plus for drama and innovation. All ages. <EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">(Oct.)

ALA Booklist

Open each two-page spread (some with black backgrounds, others with white), and out pops a letter. The ingenious paperwork puts a special spin on each one: the three-dimensional letters come out straight up and on their sides, and sometimes one letter turns into another with the pull of a tab or the addition of an overlay. S even spins like a pinwheel. This has a simple elegance that will appeal to older kids, but children just learning the alphabet will enjoy looking at letters presented in so many different ways.

Horn Book (Wed Apr 01 00:00:00 CDT 2009)

Using only black, white, and red, Bataille has crafted a near-perfect album of letters employing every trick in the pop-up and movable book lexicon. Some pop-ups are 3-D block letters, satisfying in their concreteness, while others are more tactile, forcing readers to stop and touch. Few will be able to resist repeated visits.

Kirkus Reviews

From its quad-lenticular cover (presenting A, B, C and D, depending on the angle of view) to its 3-dimensional Z, this is one showboat of a pop-up book. Remarkable paper mechanics cause some members of the alphabet to mutate and morph into their successive characters through the use of slides, pivots and peek-a-boos, while other letters stand alone in daring 3-D splendor. Perhaps the most magical pages are the translucent overlay that transforms O and P to Q and R , and the mirrored spread that converts V to W . Meant to be relished, not read (despite its bold palette of black-and-white-and-redall over), this is too fragile for flip handling and won't likely find a place on public-library shelves, but for alphabet-book collectors and paper-engineering enthusiasts, it's an absolute delight. (Toy book. All ages)