PICTURE BOOKS
If I Had a Spaceship ... Nanci Z. N. and T.R. Nelson | Nanci Nelson’s Nursery 28p, hardcover, $17.00, ISBN 979-8-9881031-1-0
The authors follow their Nano Adventures series with a fanciful interstellar journey brimming with color, creativity, and fun. The story centers on a young, unnamed narrator daydreaming about the possibilities that would exist if they owned a spaceship—a spaceship that could transport them to faraway, magical lands where there are no chores and no one to tell them what to do. As they ponder the opportunities that spaceship would provide, their fantasy surges, taking them to multiple planets, real and imaginary, on an intergalactic display of iridescent scenery, mind-boggling creatures, and more.
Though the storyline is simple, this cosmic adventure delivers plenty of fun—and room for kids to stretch their imagination muscles. The narrator zooms through “planets where the snow is purple, and rivers flow with diamonds” and a slew of unusual worlds full of interesting people, including new friends with elephant trunks instead of arms and racecar wheels in place of legs. The locales they visit are a child’s playful vision of cosmic wonders and interstellar life: meatball marina asteroids, comets that have string cheese tails, and imaginary towns that use stinkbugs to collect their garbage, while their children play on bridges built from swings.
The book’s illustrations match the frenetic, multihued pace of the story, splashing each page with brilliant, jeweled tones and kaleidoscopic galaxies. A luscious caramel waterfall takes center stage on an ice cream planet, and on the “planet where everyone has three eyes,” a local devises a secret handshake and plays epic space games with the story’s narrator. The authors close with a message as striking as the narrator’s stellar travels: “At the end of the day, the best place to go in a spaceship, is right back home. To my own room, with my own family, on my own planet.”
Cover: A | Design & typography: A- | Illustrations: A Editing: A- | Marketing copy: B+