This is a simple yet fantastic book that takes us through the journey of the process of creating paper. It’s not an in depth look but it shows kids how things are created with a lot of different components.

I believe this book is perfect for any child to read as it shows them to be conscious of the environment. I like how the author dove deep into what is behind the making of a book. This would be an amazing book to incorporate into a lesson plan when going over recycling and the affects we have in the environment. I believe the author really made it easy for children to understand how ecosystem rely on each other to work in unison. The age group I would say is pk-2nd grade I believe if it wanted to target a larger audience it would need to give more information.

A thoughtful book about looking and exploring. This book poses the question of “can you see what this is?” and in those terms, what this encompasses, as a whole, as an individual, and asks you to try and explore it. I thought it was a great book about looking into something and seeing more. It is a great book for kids and to get kids to see more than just a blank page, and to get them to begin to ask themselves about the things they see and understand. It was a simple yet beautiful book. The artwork was great and added a nice touch to the already wonderful message of the book.
* Thank you netgalley for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

A quick disclaimer: I don't have children, and although I was a Rainbow Guide leader for a number of years, I have never been a children's librarian. My opinion is as someone who teaches Bibliography, History of the Book, and the Artist's Book, and who collects artists' books, with a focus on commercially published artists' books.

I love this book and cannot wait to be able to lay hands on it. A core text in my collecting, writing and teaching is A Child of Books by Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston (London: Walker, 2016 and over 20 translations worldwide). Around that, I obtain other works that aim to talk about reading and books to children, so this one will fit right in. It will be a great discussion point for students - what makes a book with these aims an artist's book as opposed to a book with nice pictures? Where does the text take us? What level of harmony is there in the pictures and the text? What is the level of collaboration? (Jeffers and Winston collaborated in text and images, whereas here there is a clear division). Is there a level of didacticism? What is the role of the imagination?

So many great ways into thinking about these issues.

I'm putting it through as 4/5 and not 5/5 because, personally, I would dial back the message-signalling a little, and because I would like to see more blanks in a book about blank pages. However, I appreciate that I am coming to this work from a different angle from most potential purchasers (presumably people with children in the picture-book age group).

The Blank Page by Alberto Blanco and illustrated by Rob Moss Wilson is a children's book that explains how paper is made. He speaks about the many people that are involved and the different parts of nature that are affected or contribute to paper as well. This book is easy to understand and I like the simplistic illustrations that go with it because they don't distract from the topic but rather enhance the experience.