What do you think?
Rate this book
High Five
A #1 New York Times bestseller from the creators of the beloved Dragons Love Tacos comes a rollicking, rhyme-tastic, interactive high five competition--starring YOU!
Discover the lost art of the high five and improve your slapping skills just in time for the annual high five contest! From hand-limbering stretches to lessons on five-ing with finesse, readers are guided through a series of interactive challenges, each goofier than the next.
Acclaimed creative duo Adam Rubin and Daniel Salmieri have dreamed up another one-of-a-kind, laugh-out-loud book that kids will beg to read again and again.
Discover the lost art of the high five and improve your slapping skills just in time for the annual high five contest! From hand-limbering stretches to lessons on five-ing with finesse, readers are guided through a series of interactive challenges, each goofier than the next.
Acclaimed creative duo Adam Rubin and Daniel Salmieri have dreamed up another one-of-a-kind, laugh-out-loud book that kids will beg to read again and again.
64 pages, Hardcover
First published April 16, 2019
12 people are currently reading
405 people want to read
About the author
Adam Rubin
29 books399 followersAdam Rubin is the #1 New York Times best-selling author of ten critically-acclaimed picture books, including the Those Darn Squirrels trilogy, Dragons Love Tacos, Dragons Love Tacos 2: The Sequel, Secret Pizza Party, Robo-Sauce and El Chupacabras (winner of the 2020 Texas Blue Bonnet award). In between writing projects, he designs and collects optical illusions, puzzles and games. His favorite color is blue, his favorite food is fried chicken, and his favorite animal is the otter. Adam currently lives in Brooklyn.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 248 reviews
May 18, 2019
My son loved this. He really got into the high fives. I read it in ebook format so there were times I feared for my phone 🤣
April 11, 2019
Interactive and dumb. The text rhymes and has a solid rhythm at first, but that all stops about 12 pages in and becomes a random mess. Kids will still love it.
May 4, 2019
Read aloud at Barnes and Noble!
May 4, 2019
I am a big fan of Adam Rubin, love the message of this book and the bright colors!!
July 9, 2019
I think this is the first picture book EVER that I couldn't finish. It's just so blah.
June 4, 2019
Review originally published on my blog,
Nine Pages
.
I… kind of expected better from the creators of Dragons Love Tacos and Dragons Love Tacos 2. As a note, I read this first to myself and then to a crowd of children, but always with the idea of reading it to a crowd and dreading reading it to a crowd. My fears proved unfounded. I feared that every kid would want to high five the page as required by the story. I had only one little friend who was willing to high five the pages, and I had to do so first the first few times that the book required before he wanted to join in the interactive fun. I think this book would be better one-on-one and one-on-one between a reader and a listening child with whom the reader already has a playful relationship.
This story enters the reader into a high five competition. We are first introduced to our trainer, a yeti-ish creature called Sensei with a bunch of trophies on his shelves. Sensei walks the reader through the best techniques for high fiving. To win the competition, he warns, the reader will need flare. The competition begins, and the reader is pitted against a flurry of creatures (a kangaroo joey and its mother, a snake, an octopus), until we are paired with an elephant against whom we had trained. The award for winning the competition (which the reader does) is a trophy at the end of the book that takes up a two-page spread and requires the book to be turned 90 degrees to view properly.
The text mostly rhymes with the instruction to “HIGH FIVE” breaking the rhythm and highlighting the command even more. The illustrations are done in a bold neon palette colored pencil with a lot of white.
I… kind of expected better from the creators of Dragons Love Tacos and Dragons Love Tacos 2. As a note, I read this first to myself and then to a crowd of children, but always with the idea of reading it to a crowd and dreading reading it to a crowd. My fears proved unfounded. I feared that every kid would want to high five the page as required by the story. I had only one little friend who was willing to high five the pages, and I had to do so first the first few times that the book required before he wanted to join in the interactive fun. I think this book would be better one-on-one and one-on-one between a reader and a listening child with whom the reader already has a playful relationship.
This story enters the reader into a high five competition. We are first introduced to our trainer, a yeti-ish creature called Sensei with a bunch of trophies on his shelves. Sensei walks the reader through the best techniques for high fiving. To win the competition, he warns, the reader will need flare. The competition begins, and the reader is pitted against a flurry of creatures (a kangaroo joey and its mother, a snake, an octopus), until we are paired with an elephant against whom we had trained. The award for winning the competition (which the reader does) is a trophy at the end of the book that takes up a two-page spread and requires the book to be turned 90 degrees to view properly.
The text mostly rhymes with the instruction to “HIGH FIVE” breaking the rhythm and highlighting the command even more. The illustrations are done in a bold neon palette colored pencil with a lot of white.
May 7, 2019
Yes, it is about high fiving. I read it to grandkids and it went from zero to sixty in 3 pages. As soon as we got to the page of different high fives, everybody was excited, especially the 8 year old. This is a keeper.
Warning: It will get physical.
Warning: It will get physical.
May 14, 2019
The pictures were not my favorite, but if you already love dragons love tacos then you'll probably enjoy the illustrations in this one.
Very cute story, it would be really fun for a story time with pre-k - 2 grade.
Very cute story, it would be really fun for a story time with pre-k - 2 grade.
April 27, 2019
Another classic by this amazing duo!
May 9, 2019
Adam Rubin has done it again with this new book!!! A fun and interactive book for kids, and kids of all ages for that matter!!! 🙋♀️✋❤
May 13, 2019
Lovely rhymes and a knee slapper, if you’re reading to kids on your lap! A lively competition that lets everyone play, illustrated with Rubin’s/Salmieri’s crayon style.
June 4, 2019
Give it to me up high! Great book for small children!
January 1, 2022
This is a silly and goofy children’s picture book that is written in rhyme and has bright and colourful illustrations. It is about a made up high five contest.
April 17, 2019
This book stands out on a shelf because it is NEON. All of the pages are very brightly illustrated. It would make for a good read-aloud to an elementary aged kid, I think it's too long for preschool. Rhyming text encourages the reader to participate by high fiving the book pages throughout the story. There's a high five tournament veteran teaching the reader how to compete and then the reader participates in multiple rounds against various animals. The animal adaptations make for interesting competition (The lizard can disappear! The octopus has 8 hands, get them all!)
Overall a fun, bright story that encourages reader participation.
Overall a fun, bright story that encourages reader participation.
April 27, 2019
Kids love rhyming and interaction and this book has both to offer. Who doesn't like to give High Fives to greet, affirm, and praise a job well-done. Kids will have such fun putting High-Fives into action with those around them. Readers will experience "first-hand" a series of challenges that will have them giggling I'm sure. The pièce de résistance? ... the reader gets a trophy in the end! How fun is that? The book stars YOU and YOU get to join in the celebration of High-Fiving with finesse and ne plus ultra. Adam Rubin and Daniel Salmieri have created a book that deserves some hand clapping praise. 👏👏👏👏👏. Great job!
Read
August 22, 2019Delightful! Will have kids in an uproar and barely able to sit still. There will definitely be interaction and hands-on with this book. High Five gets a high five rating in my estimation! The text in written in a poetic fashion - making a great read aloud. The illustrations are done in crayons and sketching, in the brightest colors ever imaginable! The text and illustrations compliment each other to bring a lot of fun and laughter to the reader. Is a book children will want to read over and over again!
May 1, 2019
This book definitely gets a High Five rating. Adam Rubin is always enjoyable as a writer and Daniel Salmieri does a great job with his unique style of drawings. Like all Rubin books, this one is funny and kids enjoy it. It is very interactive as my children were high fiving the pages. It was a new library book so I’d hate to see what this one will look like in a few years after hundreds of high fives. Looking forward to the next Rubin book.
October 10, 2018
This is a fun, rhyme-filled, interactive book about a high five contest-- and the reader gets to participate! After practicing your high-fives with Sensei and Glenn, you're ready to take those skills to the big leagues. Can you out-five a big bear or a shifty chameleon? Who could the champion possibly be? You won't know until you try!
May 24, 2019
This is such a joy from beginning to end. An incredible next venture for the Dragons duo, Adam Rubin and Daniel Salmieri. My five-year-old asks for High Five every night because it asks her to be creative—not just with the fives she presents to the characters in the books, but the playful, alliterative text gets her brain going. She learns a new vocabulary word with every read!
May 30, 2019
This book is a great interactive book that my 7 and 10 year old enjoyed. There's lots of high fives happening throughout the book. As a one-on-one (or one-on-two in my case) read aloud, it was great. It might take some creativity and/or patience to read this to a whole class/group, since you are supposed to actually high five the book, but it could be done.
May 31, 2019
I think this book just skid into the number four slot. Rhymes, interactive high fiving and some seriously cool art with the best color choices I've seen in a kids book in a really long time. Recommend!
February 18, 2019
I was not thrilled. It was... bright. I don’t know. Some parts were funny.
April 22, 2019
High five for the illustrations!
June 4, 2019
Cute story about having fun and doing your best to be the best
June 12, 2019
This was a brilliant and interactive book my 2 and 4 year old love!
September 7, 2019
Delightfully silly. A good interactive book for one-on-one reading, and a definite pick if you enjoyed the Dragons Love Tacos books.
August 14, 2019
Silly, interactive, rhyming
Good for a lap reading
Good for a lap reading
August 24, 2019
Interactive, fun, kids love it, I love I it.
September 7, 2020
What a peculiar book to be reading during the Covid-19 pandemic. In rhyming text, this picture book is all about how to give the best high fives to win a high fiving competition. While it’s a really cute idea under normal circumstances, maybe it’s just not the best time to use with a classroom full of kids high fiving. Here’s the lines from one page:
Let’s make sure you understand
how to position your hand:
Palm out
Fingers spread
Wrist straight
Elbow bent.
Next, we need to find a friend,
someone to high five against.
You cannot high five yourself–
that’s called clapping, that won’t help.
Even if a child is reading the book alone, the story also encourages the reader to high five with the characters from the book. So when a hand appears in the illustrations, the reading will slap the illustrated hand. Unfortunately, this book didn’t share how the illustrations were created, but they look like they were colored with actual crayons.
For more children's literature, middle grade literature, and YA literature reviews, feel free to visit my personal blog at The Miller Memo!
Let’s make sure you understand
how to position your hand:
Palm out
Fingers spread
Wrist straight
Elbow bent.
Next, we need to find a friend,
someone to high five against.
You cannot high five yourself–
that’s called clapping, that won’t help.
Even if a child is reading the book alone, the story also encourages the reader to high five with the characters from the book. So when a hand appears in the illustrations, the reading will slap the illustrated hand. Unfortunately, this book didn’t share how the illustrations were created, but they look like they were colored with actual crayons.
For more children's literature, middle grade literature, and YA literature reviews, feel free to visit my personal blog at The Miller Memo!
November 14, 2019
Children love listening to this as an audiobook. Super fun and interesting.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 248 reviews