Oh My a Fly!

by Jan Pieńkowski

A delightful interpretation of the classic children's poem about the old woman who swallowed a fly. Bright colors, witty illustrations and imaginative paper engineering give each character a personality all its own.

Genres: Childrens, Picture Books

Hardcover

First published June 20, 1989

About the author

Jan Michel Pieńkowski is a Polish-born British illustrator and author of children's books. He is probably best known for his Meg and Mog books with writer Helen Nicoll and for his pop-up books, including Haunted House (winner of the 1980 Kate Greenaway Medal), Robot, Dinner Time, Good Night and seventeen others.

Pieńkowski illustrated his first book at the age of eight, as a present for his father. During World War II, Pieńkowski's family moved about Europe, finally settling in Herefordshire, England in 1946. He attended the Cardinal Vaughan School in London, and later read English and Classics at King's College, Cambridge.

After leaving university Pieńkowski founded the Gallery Five greeting cards company. He began illustrating children's books in his spare time, but soon found the work taking over all his time. He began working with children's author Joan Aiken in 1968; he later won the first of two Kate Greenaway Medals in 1972 for his illustrations for Aiken's The Kingdom Under the Sea.

Pieńkowski has had a life-long interest in stage design. He was commissioned to provide designs for Theatre de Complicite, Beauty and the Beast for the Royal Ballet, and Sleeping Beauty at Disneyland Paris.

In 2005 Pienkowski contracted a civil partnership with David Walser, with whom he has been in a relationship for over forty years.

Pienkowski suffers from bipolar disorder.

Reviews

[Kellee Moye · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read to Trent by Natalie :)

[Dorothy Mahoney · Rating 5 out of 5]

Marvellous pop-up! The old woman who keeps swallowing things is never shown and neither is the fly. However, the spider, bat, bird, cow and final ghost are fantastic pop-ups in watercolour that leap out at the reader. The smaller size of the book makes it a great traveller.

[Abby · Rating 4 out of 5]

What now

[Mandy Scheuren]

This story is one great piece of art! “Oh My a Fly!” represents the story, “There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly!” only this story has pop-out pictures. It looks as if Pienkowski used only watercolors. There is no color on the pages themselves except black text. Each time you open a page there is a new picture of what the old woman swallowed. I can see a younger child becoming antsy with this book as it is only five pages long. Each page contains quite a bit of text and with a young child, they are more anxious and fascinated to see what is going to pop up next rather than what the story is about!

[Cemeread]

This book is basically a pop-up, shortened version of The Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly. The four animals swallowed are the pop-ups. After the old woman swallows a horse she dies of course. The pop- up for this page is a ghost (It does not look like an old lady). This version would work for a Halloween reading as the animals are not friendly looking and include a bat and spider.

[Suzanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fun read-aloud!

[Robin · Rating 3 out of 5]

A pop-up version of the classic rhyme.

[Marcia Van Camp]

Pop-up books are the best, the art is really silly and fun on this