Books with author Alastair Reid

What can words be, or rather, what can’t they be? Poet Alastair Reid introduces children and adults to the wondrous waywardness of words in Ounce Dice Trice, a delicious confection and a wildly unexpected exploration of sound and sense and nonsense that is like nothing else. Reid offers light words (willow, whirr, spinnaker) and heavy words (galoshes, mugwump, crumb), words on the move and odd words, words that read both ways and words that read the wrong way around (rezagrats), along with much else. Accompanied by Ben Shahn’s glorious drawings, Ounce Dice Trice is a book of endless delights, not to mention the only place where you can find the answer to the question: What is a gongoozler? Well, all I can say is quoz.

When you’re a kid, there are lots of things you’re not supposed to do. But what if you didn’t really do any of those things, what if you just imagined them? Then it wouldn’t matter if your supposings were silly, impossible, or even a little naughty—because they’re all just in your head. Alastair Reid’s book is a monument to the liberating power of unfettered thought. Here he reunites with a frequent collaborator, the famed illustrator and designer Bob Gill, to muse on the possibilities:Supposing I read a book about how to change into animals and said a spell and changed myself into a cat and when I climbed on the book to change myself back I found I couldn’t read. . .Supposing I had a twin brother but we never told anyone and only went to school half the time each. . .Supposing a very beautiful lady fell in love with me and wanted me to marry her but I just yawned and said Maybe . . .