Isabel Minhos Martins

With the idea that you can't start too young, I just read a little Portuguese children's picture book, Don't Cross The Line, which is a cheerful way to show children that people acting together can overcome tyranny. There's a guard with a machine gun on the first left-hand page. He stops all characters from moving on. He has orders to allow no one to occupy a right-hand page because the "general reserves the right to keep the page blank, so he can join the story whenever he feels like it." show more The characters don't riot or fight. They joyfully dance, float, creep and haunt as they get more and more crowded on the left-hand page asking why they can't advance and giving reasons they need to. And it turns out the guard is just as human as the rest of them. For the little political activists in your family. show less

Taking the idea of the second as a starting point, Portuguese author Isabel Minhós Martins highlights twenty-three different occurrences that all happen at the same instant, all around the world. From an elevator getting stuck between two floors in New York City to a boat unexpectedly caught in a storm in the Baltic Sea, from a package arriving at its destination in Karabuk, Turkey to a man resting on a bench in Tokyo, there are millions of things happening at any given moment.

Originally show more published in Portugal as O mundo num segundo, this entertaining and educational picture-book offers a snapshot of the world as it unfolds in one single second. Referencing concepts such as time, and geographic distance and diversity, The World In a Second is the sort of book that curious children will enjoy poring over, and that will lead them to think about the disparate but interconnected nature of the world and its many residents. The bold, graphic artwork by Bernardo P. Carvalho makes the perusing of this book a distinct aesthetic pleasure, while the afterword, in which the location and exact local time of each scene in the book is listed, fills in specific additional information. Recommended to anyone looking for children's books that address the idea of multiple events unfolding at one time, worldwide, or who just want a picture-book that celebrates our diverse world. show less

Dizem os especialistas que a descoberta do mundo começa logo na barriga da mãe. Lá dentro, aconchegados, já ouvimos música, reconhecemos vozes, acompanhamos ao segundo as emoções maternas. Mas é como se todas as descobertas aguardassem por uma confirmação… uma confirmação que chega no dia em que nascemos. Aí sim, começa a grande aventura. Do respirar, do provar, do sentir… Pelas páginas deste livro desfilam algumas das descobertas que nos fizeram (e fazem) espantar. show more Descobertas tão simples como a cor que pinta o fundo do mar, o som de uma folha ao pousar no chão, ou o cheiro das férias quando chega o verão. Um livro que dá as boas-vindas a todos os bebés. show less

Okay, I am in love with this book. It is interactive but not with flaps and pop-ups. The book asks you to make noise with your fingers on the pages. For example, on pages 3-4 there are pictures of hands made of dots with red dots as the fingertips. The text reads "Put one hand here." on page 3, on page 4 the text reads "And the other on here. Are you ready? If so, patter your fingers on the page like a drum roll: let the adventure begin!" And on the bottom of the page are red dots for your show more fingertips to patter and make a drumroll. I wish I had this book when my children were babies because they would have eaten it up. show less