See the Rabbit; Doll and Teddy; Baby Sleeps; Blue Pram

These four board books use that unfortunate publisher's trick of pulling images from a well-established book and reworking them into a new format, presumably to increase sales by creating a new audience. The Baby's Catalogue has been given this treatment here. For those familiar with Janet Ahlberg's original pictures, it is initially a delight to see them blown up, losing none of their freshness since first appearing in 1982. For those anticipating a good Allan Ahlberg text to go with them - witty, well-constructed and apt - prepare for a disappointment.

The books each consist of pictures, selected without reference to the theme of the original volume, and given a one-word or short phrase caption. See the Rabbit repeats the irritating 'See the ...' phrase on each page (remember it from reading books of old?) while Baby Sleeps, the most successful of the four, has a rhyming text loosely following a toddler's day. Doll and Teddy shows a pair of objects or people on each page with no obvious rationale for their selection; Blue Pram purports to be a 'colour' book but as the original drawings were not made with this purpose in mind, a young reader might find focusing on the required part of the picture quite difficult.

I am surprised at Allan Ahlberg's compliance with this project - it seems an unnecessary abuse of the original concept of The Baby's Catalogue, and rather than leading new readers to that classic volume it might well induce a 'done that' reaction. This could have been avoided by a more carefully thought-out selection of images/story-line, and texts which through rhythm and cadence help toddler sharers to get a feel for language and the shape of even a simple narrative.

At £3.99 each these titles compare very poorly with the full Catalogue at £4.99 in paperback or $10.99 in hardback - I know which I would buy.