Haunted House

by Jan Pieńkowski

Book Overview

For the first time ever, Haunted House is available in a mini-edition featuring intricate pop-ups, lift-the-flaps, and pull tabs on every page. Full-color.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0763628182
• ISBN13: 9780763628185
• Release Date: August 2005
• Publisher: Candlewick Press (MA)
• Length: 12 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 7.8" x 11.8"
• Age Range: 2 years and up
• Grade Range: Preschool and higher

Customer Reviews

This haunted house is a SCREAM!

I bought this fun book after I read the favorable reviews here, and I am a halloween nut. My kids and I love this book! The pop-ups are awesome and the quality of the book is excellent. What I am not quite sure of is the dialoge/storyline that goes with it. I have looked at and read this book numerous times and still have no clue who the "doctor" is...is it Dr.Frankenstein? Dr. Doolittle perhaps? I am left anxious with no idea who the mysterious doctor is and in the last page, just where did he go? I am thinking he is in the wooden box heading for Translyvania and trying in vain to saw himself out - yet when I peek into the box, I see no doctor, just a bomb with a lit fuse! Cool pop-ups but pretty bizarre story to go along with it.

THE EPITOME OF POP-UPS

Multi-talented doesn't begin to describe Jan Pienkowski. Born in Poland in 1936 he made his first book when he was only 8-years-old. It was a gift for his father. Due to the war his family left Poland and eventually settled in England where he would attend Kings College. It seems that his interest in stage design developed while he was there. Since his college days he has worked in publicity, advertising, and done stage designs for The Royal Ballet and Disneyland, Paris. Here, in America, we probably know him best for his amazing paper art. His pop-up books don't just spring forward, but swirl as in an octopus busily doing dishes or soar as in three geese flying across a mantel. Youngsters will be delighted to find this and so very much more in Haunted House. This is a place where ghosts hide under the stairwell and a portrait of La Gio Conda watches with the touch of a tab. Refrigerator doors swing open to reveal a very Muenster-like kitchen, while King Kong holds forth in the living room. Each double page is an amazing array of spooky sights just waiting for young fingers to release them. Haunted House is the epitome of pop-ups, a prototype for all budding paper artists. - Gail Cooke

Probably the best pop-up book ever

I used to love this book so much as a kid. Really creative scenes and many different actions. I remember the eyes moving in the pictures, swirling vortexes in the kitchen cupboard, the octopus in the sink, the skeleton in the closet... Wow. I was even sometimes a little scared to look under the flap.

Excellent--definitely worth the price!

Jan Pienkowski's Haunted House is a terrific book, with lots of great colorful detailed illustrations and a variety of popups, pullouts, dial turns, etc. Except for the last, each of the five double pages has at least three "activities", and some have more. Many of the pictures are funny, with things like a black cat in the toilet--the bathroom scene is one of my two favorites, in fact, with a fantastically silly buglike alien with peppermint lips bursting through the wall and an alligator in the tub. Although nothing is particularly frightening for most, parents will want to exercise a bit of judgement if their children are very sensitive--there's no blood, but there is a skeleton in the closet and a ghost hovering over a bed. If my child were prone to fears I would definitely skip this one. But most kids will love it, and, like Sesame Street, adults will find a few details put in only for them--the bookshelf, for example, has books labelled "Poe", "Bosch" and "Von Dani" with the remaining letters of that last name off the page--recognise it? (Hint: There's a spaceship on the same page!)We were given this book for my son probably 16 years ago. My daughter also enjoyed it as a child and in fact was just studying the pop-up techniques for her high school design technology class. Our original copy has held up well after all the years and all the loving, which speaks volumes for its construction--kudos to "paper engineer Tor Lokvig"! Pages are thick card stock and only a few of the popup effects have suffered any of the ravages of time in our copy; but I still would recommend getting a new copy rather than buying one used, especially sight unseen. And at the price, even a new one is definitely a bargain!

The Haunted House takes the reader on an imaginative tour!

The Haunted House is a vivid and cleverly created pop-up book which dares its reader to embark on an imaginative rampage through a haunted mansion. Pienkowski has created an interactive world in which a woman's portrait eyes you with a playful menace, a spaghetti monster leaps from the refrigerator, and you come face to face with a hilarious blue alien. There are literally skeletons in the closet of this book! Children will love this book for its fantastic images; adults will appreciate the unique detail and craftsmanship. This is, by far, the most fascinating pop-up on the market!