cover image On the Way to the Beach

On the Way to the Beach

Henry Cole. Greenwillow Books, $16.99 (26pp) ISBN 978-0-688-17515-3

Henry Cole encourages youngsters to take a closer look at their surroundings in his paper-over-board On the Way to the Beach. Gatefold flaps on spreads of marsh, dune and beach environments open to reveal animal life that seem to be hidden in the everyday natural world. As the unseen narrator sits ""very still in the sassafras beneath a loblolly pine,"" for instance, she sees ""a swallowtail butterfly,/ a summer tanager,/ a scarlet snake"" and more. A final page labels each creature clearly.