Can You See Me? A Book About Feeling Small

Can You See Me? A Book about Feeling Small, by Gökçe İrten, is a whimsical picture book that aims to explore the concept of proportional size. It is suitable for children ages four through seven.

Can You See Me? meanders through various examples of proportional size in a seemingly random, stream-of-consciousness manner. For example, readers are told that “Ladybugs can float in water for 24 hours” on one page, that a person would need a bigger pool to try floating like a ladybug on the next page, and then that “Elephants are so big that when one of their footprints fills with water, it creates a natural habitat for more than 60 different species” on the next. This concept book contains no narrative or characters. Its second-person narration is a clear invitation to readers to identify with the concept; however, the nonsensical structure and condescending cues to readers—i.e., “Let’s think some more”—are more likely to insult readers than encourage them to relate.

The illogical, hectic transitions in the written text are paralleled by the images which are rendered in brightly-coloured cartoons. The cartoon style occasionally morphs into mixed media with the addition of random photo clips and paper collage in a derivative imitation of a (now cliched) style of picture book illustration that has become common over the past decade.

Because of the disjointedness in Can You See Me?, the book will not provide an effective foundation for conveying the concept it attempts to communicate. Superior picture book options for this age group are Big and Small, by Jo Ellen Bogart, for proportional size, and They All Saw a Cat, by Brendan Wenzel, for perspective.