Customer Reviews

Haunted House Mini-Edition

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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

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!