Title: Baby Penguins Everywhere!

Author/Illustrator: Melissa Guion

Publisher: Philomel Books

Year: 2012

Word Count: Approx. 115

Summary: When a penguin finds a hat floating by, she discovers something inside…baby penguins!

The focus of today’s PB 14:14 blog challenge post is Pacing. Baby Penguins Everywhere! is an excellent example of a picture book that employs “page-turn” pacing. The author and designers of this book know how to split up a sentence so that it starts on one page and ends on the next, creating that magical “suspense” moment that urges the reader to turn the page. Here are the first two pages, a double-page spread, with text on one side and an illustration on the other:

The text reads, “Once there was a penguin…”

Now of course the reader will want to turn the page to find out more. Here’s the next double-page spread:

The sentence from the preceding page is finished in the text on the left side:

“…who was all alone.”

Then the text on the right side of the spread reads, “She enjoyed the peace and quiet of the sea and ice. Yet some days…”

As you can see, the sentence is split once again, causing the reader to turn the page. So on the next page (after the page turn) the sentence is completed: “…she felt lonely.”

This type of pacing is used quite effectively throughout the book. In some instances, half the sentence is on one side and half is on the other side of a double-page spread. And in one instance, a sentence is split and spread over three pages (four pages, if you count a page in between that has only a picture). The text on each page is very short and, in some instances, made even shorter by splitting the sentences. I could go on and on about it, so if you want to study pacing in a picture book, Baby Penguins Everywhere! is a super example.