Alice Hoogstad (b. 1957) has been illustrating children’s books since the late 1980s, collaborating with great children’s authors such as Rindert Kromhout, Mirjam Oldenhave, Hans Kuyper and Guus Kuijer. Published credits of Alice Hoogstad include Bolder and the Boat (with Ton Wegman) and Guus Kuijer’s Polleke. Monster Book is Hoogstad’s first picture book without words.
Hans Kuyper and Alice Hoogstad combined forces to create this lavish rhyming picture book, with emotions that simply leap off the pages. The fun starts on the endpapers, where Hoogstad portrays a colourful parade of creatures: the lonely elephant with his sadly drooping trunk, the cheerful frogs playing leapfrog (what else?) and the happy bear cheering and waving his clumsy paws in the air.
A black-and-white town becomes more and more colourful as a little girl sets off for a walk with her sticks of chalk. Minutely detailed illustrations transform into a riot of colour.
