Overview

Board book: 16 pages

ISBN: 9781474922661

Dimensions: 22.5 x 1.9 x 28.2 cm

Written by: Alice James

Illustrated by: Shaw Nielsen

Author’s blog:

Lift-the-Flap Periodic Table is an introduction to all the elements in the universe – shiny, radioactive, explosive, gaseous, and everything in between.

Writing this book was a really exciting process. I started off by researching every element in turn, getting to know what it’s like, what it’s used for, and where it’s found, making a mega-document of interesting information. Next was my favourite part of the whole thing – turning each element into a character. I sat down with our brilliant designer Emily to sketch out about 100 different characters, from goblins to fishermen, aliens to ravers.

Each character had to be carefully constructed to give a lot of information – each one is colour coded, so you know where to find it on the table, has a distinct bottom half, so you know whether it’s a solid, liquid or gas, and has a clear persona that tells you a bit about it.

The Periodic Table is split up into sections, with elements grouped according to their personalities. Each page in our book features one of those sections, colour-coded to make it clear and easy to remember. I chose a fact or two for each element on a page, particularly stuff that sounded amazing, like that indium screams when you bend it, or that barium rocks glow in the dark.