You re invited to a birthday party! It s Benjamin s birthday. The present Morris brings to give Benjamin is what Morris would like to get himself, and he refuses to hand it over. But Morris can t have fun at a party while he s holding on to a package. The longer he holds it, the bigger it seems to get. It grows into one enormous nuisance, and the only way to get rid of it is to open it up. Morris s present turns out to be something marvelous for everyone to do. With the colorful Morris and the beautiful and funny pictures, Lore Segal and Boris Kulikov have made a birthday party that young readers will want to come to again and again. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

With empathy and imagination, this tale explores the sometimes angst-filled arena of children's birthday parties. An opening scene reveals young Morris so immersed in the picture he is painting that he does not want to go to his friend Benjamin's party. Any child can relate to the situation Segal (Tell Me a Mitzi) maps out next: after Morris chooses a present, he longs to keep the birthday boy's gift for himself. At Benjamin's party, Morris holds the blue-ribboned gift box in a death grip. Emphasizing the psychological aspects of the situation, Kulikov, in an impressive debut, portrays the box literally growing to enormous proportions, inhibiting Morris from eating his cake and playing with his friends. Finally, the boy relinquishes the burdensome gift and, after initial disappointment (" `It's only paints,' said Leah. `Paints we get in school,' said Rosie"), the party-goers join Morris in a gleeful painting spree, indicated by blobs and splatters scattered across the pages. "There was umber and sepia and olive and emerald. There was rose madder and viridian..." Kulikov's extraordinary paintings would fit right into a Roald Dahl tale. An off-kilter, funhouse feeling pervades the full-spread compositions, and the children (dressed in vintage knickers, sailor suits and bonnets) sport big heads atop bodies tapering into tiny feet, and eyes with the unsettling fixed gaze of marionettes. He softens this delectably mad style with an autumnal palette of mossy greens, apricots and cocoa, and a sincere undercurrent of compassion for the artist-protagonist. Ages 4-8. (May) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information