{"id":12695,"date":"2014-03-03T07:00:58","date_gmt":"2014-03-03T12:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=12695"},"modified":"2014-03-03T07:00:58","modified_gmt":"2014-03-03T12:00:58","slug":"a-board-book-love-affair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=12695","title":{"rendered":"A Board Book Love Affair"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left;\">I cannot remember when the lap-sized board book made its appearance, but I&#8217;m sure glad it did. I <a href=\"http:\/\/wordpress.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/kissgood-2.jpeg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-12697\" style=\"border: 1px solid black; margin: 5px;\" alt=\"kissgood\" src=\"http:\/\/wordpress.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/kissgood-2.jpeg\" width=\"240\" height=\"235\" \/><\/a>just love these books. I&#8217;m a fan of board books in general. Their ease of use for babies and toddlers is genius as is their practical indestructible format, but I often found regular size board books too small. I hated that the art in them was often missing something of their hardcover counterparts. Then came the lap-sized book, and the art was huge and glorious.<\/p>\n<p>The genius behind the larger board lies in two areas. The first is the art because it can now be showcased in a book that kids can&#8217;t rip or get paper cuts reading. Little ones explore the world with their mouths and larger board books allow them a lot of room to chew. The second thing I love about these is parents can sit with a baby in their laps and have a full-sized <a href=\"http:\/\/wordpress.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/ten-2.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-12698\" alt=\"ten\" src=\"http:\/\/wordpress.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/ten-2.jpg\" width=\"400\" height=\"343\" \/><\/a>reading experience without worrying about damaging a book. It is so easy for little hands, surprisingly strong hands, to just scrunch up the pages of a book while they&#8217;re being read to. The lap-sized board book allows for close, together reading time without the parent correcting the child about not hurting the book. This is freedom for all involved.<br \/>\nThe art is so important in books for babies, whether it&#8217;s the contrast of colors or spotting the balloon and the mouse in\u00a0<em>Good Night, Gorilla\u00a0<\/em>or being able to see all the babies in\u00a0<em>Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes.\u00a0<\/em>I love seeing little ones poring over a book and taking in the pictures. And just because they&#8217;re little doesn&#8217;t mean every reading experience should be reduced for safety&#8217;s sake.<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/wordpress.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/gorilla-2.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-12696\" style=\"border: 1px solid black; margin: 5px;\" alt=\"gorilla\" src=\"http:\/\/wordpress.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/gorilla-2.jpg\" width=\"240\" height=\"182\" \/><\/a>Lastly, lap-sized board books make great new baby gifts that can be enjoyed by older kids who might think of regular-sized board books as only for babies. All my younger nieces and nephews get this size book now. I eschew hardcovers until kids are at least three or four just because it&#8217;s hard to see a book get damaged by a kid being a kid. That&#8217;s not fair. And so many great books are now available in the lap size that it&#8217;s easy to keep everyone stocked in books.<br \/>\nOh, and the truly great thing about the lap-sized book is it can be comfortably read with a child in your lap, a chubby hand on your knee and a little one saying, &#8220;Again&#8221; when you&#8217;ve come to the end.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One bookseller&#8217;s reasons to love lap-sized board books.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12695"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12695\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}