Review of Patricia von Pleasantsquirrel, by James Proimos

Delightfully Silly, Fantasy, Picture Book Review 0

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Patricia von Pleasantsquirrel
by James Proimos

Dial Books for Young Readers, 2009. 48 pages.

“Once there was a princess who had not yet found her princessdom.”

So begins the story of a little girl named Patricia von Pleasantsquirrel. The story might seem predictable: A little girl does not feel she is treated royally enough by her family, goes off to an imaginary land to be a princess, but winds up deciding that princess duties are not for her, and she would rather be home. However, this book is filled with delightful, quirky, and unexpected details that make the story not predictable at all.

I love the reason Patricia sets off to find her princessdom. She reads Where the Wild Things Are and thinks:

“If a silly boy with no social graces could be made king with no effort at all, then imagine how easy it would be for me to find my princessdom.”

Indeed, she takes off and flies far, far away and is quickly made princess of the Land of the Hippos, where she is granted the royal privileges her heart desires, and learns the lessons you might expect in rather unexpected ways.

This is a lovely and silly book for anyone who’s ever had a hankering to be a princess, or even a prince.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/patricia_von_pleasantsquirrel.html

Review of Winnie-the-Pooh audiobook, read by Peter Dennis

Animal Characters, Audiobooks, Children's Fiction Review, Classics, Delightfully Silly, Humorous, Stand-outs, Starred Review 0

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Winnie-the-Pooh

written by A. A. Milne

performed by Peter Dennis

Book published in 1926.  Blackstone Audiobooks, 2004.  3 hours on 3 cassettes.

Starred review.

Sonderbooks Stand-out 2010: Wonderful Rereads

I’ve already reviewed Winnie-the-Pooh at length and said how special it is to me: http://www.sonderbooks.com/ChildrensFiction/winniethepooh.html .

Although part of the specialness is that I fell in love with my husband while reading Winnie-the-Pooh together, I find that the book is still just as special even though my husband has now left me.  Winnie-the-Pooh has been part of my life much longer than he has.

I have checked out several cassettes from the library that I want to listen to before we end up getting rid of all our cassettes, and Winnie-the-Pooh is one.  (Though the same version is now available on CD.)  It was the perfect book to listen to while my son and I were making lots of trips back and forth while toting our possessions for a move across town.

Few things are as much fun as reading Winnie-the-Pooh aloud, especially with a group of enthusiastic readers.  However, when you are driving, you can’t read yourself, and this performance by Peter Dennis is the next best thing.  He is so exceptionally good at doing the voices of the characters, it’s a bit intimidating.  (Though I will not let that stop me.)

I was appalled to learn that my teenage son doesn’t remember most of the stories.  Surely I had read them to him enough times?  He learned to write his name P-O-O-H, for goodness’ sake! 

Anyway, we thoroughly enjoyed listening to and laughing over them in the middle of the serious business of moving.  We will definitely have to do some Pooh readalouds together just as soon as we find the box where my copy is hiding.

You can’t ask for a better family listening experience than this version of Winnie-the-Pooh.  And I don’t care if your family is all adults or includes toddlers.  Those who are only familiar with the Disney versions may not realize the wonderful subtle humor and charm of the original books.  It’s hard to imagine anyone of any age not enjoying these stories.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/winnie_the_pooh_audio.html

Review of Orangutan Tongs, by Jon Agee

Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review, Poetry, Stand-outs, Starred Review 0

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Orangutan Tongs

Poems to Tangle Your Tongue

by Jon Agee

Disney/Hyperion Books, 2009.  48 pages.

Starred review.
Sonderbooks Stand-out 2010: #2 Picture Books

This book is entirely too much fun.  I brought it home and read it to my teenage son, and, as I suspected, he couldn’t resist trying it himself.  For Dr. Seuss’s birthday, we recently had a tweetle beetle binge from Fox in Socks, so it was fun to read to each other and laugh from a new book where I didn’t have the advantage of about forty years of practice.

Orangutan Tongs (Can you resist saying that title aloud?) is a book of tongue twister poems, with illustrations.  They are all quite silly and good for fun and laughter.

My son claimed that he had not been practicing, but I found it highly suspicious that when I came home from work the next day, he was suddenly able to recite the Peggy Babcock poem:

Peggy Babcock at work.  Peggy Babcock at play.

Peggy Babcock tomorrow.  Peggy Babcock today.

Peggy Babcock, repeated, is tricky to say:

Peggy Babcock, Peggy Babcock, Peggy Babcock, ole!

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Review of The Facttracker, by Jason Carter Eaton

Children's Fiction Review, Delightfully Silly, Fantasy, Light Reading 0

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The Facttracker

by Jason Carter Eaton

illustrations by Pascale Constantin

HarperCollins, 2008.  260 pages.

http://www.harpercollinschildrens.com/

Reminiscent of The Phantom Tollbooth, The Facttracker tells of the town Traakerfaxx, where the townspeople get Facts from the Facttracker in his Factory and sell them to the world.

One person in Traakerfaxx does not have any facts about himself.  A sad and lonely boy lives there.  He is small, but not too small.  The facts about the just small enough boy were lost shortly after he was born.  He has gotten messages that the Facttracker is looking for them, but hasn’t heard anything for quite some time.

All is going well until the day of the explosion.  That’s the day the just small enough boy gets to enter the Factory and meet the Facttracker.

After the Factory explodes (and you wouldn’t want me to spoil the surprise and tell you why, would you?), the Facttracker’s twin brother Ersatz shows up.  Ersatz takes the Seed of Truth and builds, in place of the Factory, a Liebrary.  He shows the townspeople and their clever, handsome mayor that lies are a lot more fun to sell than facts.

The Facttracker is imprisioned in the belly of the Liebrary, and it’s up to the just small enough boy to save the world.

This book is a lot of silly fun, if you can keep yourself from objecting to the places where the analogy breaks down.  If you’re willing to take it all with tongue in cheek, you will have plenty to enjoy.

The author is full of authorial asides to the reader and lots of playing with authorial conventions.  For example, Chapter 13 has the heading crossed out, with the title, “There Will Not Be a Chapter 13 Because It Might Be Unlucky and the Facttracker Needs All the Luck He Can Get Now.”

If you’re willing to not take it too seriously, you can have a good deal of fun reading this book.

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Review of Down Girl and Sit: Bad to the Bone, by Lucy Nolan

Animal Characters, Beginning Chapter Books, Children's Fiction Review, Delightfully Silly, Humorous, Starred Review 0

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Down Girl and Sit

Bad to the Bone

by Lucy Nolan

illustrated by Mike Reed

Marshall Cavendish Children, 2008.  53 pages.

Starred review

www.marshallcavendish.us/kids

I delight to think of a beginning reader decoding this book and being rewarded all along the way with hilarious inside jokes.  Down Girl and Sit: Bad to the Bone has four chapters, so it is for a child already reading.  But the chapters are short, full of pictures, and laugh out loud funny in a way the narrator would never understand — but the reader does.

Down Girl tells us the story of how she and her friend Sit attempt to train their masters with simple concepts.  For example:  “Cats are bad.  Dogs are good.”

The reader knows that Down Girl is completely misinterpreting her master Rruff’s intentions, as Down Girl earnestly explains how she loyally carries them out.

Especially delightful and reminiscent of “Who’s on First?” is the chapter after Down Girl and Sit tried to be “bad to the bone” to get attention.  Their masters take them, along with another dog Hush, to Obedience School. 

Their poor masters are not very quick learners!  They keep calling Down Girl and Hush by Sit’s name!  Then they start using the name of some dog named “Stay.”

This could have gone on forever, but thank goodness a squirrel ran past.  We all jumped.  We barked and tried to chase him.  Our masters yanked on our leashes.

“Down girl!”  “Sit!”  “Hush!”

Finally!  They got our names right.  Now they might pass the class.

We looked to see if the teacher was smiling.  He was not.

Well, I can’t blame him.  We have been working with our masters for a long time.  We haven’t gotten very far either.

I wanted the teacher to cheer up, so I jumped up and kissed him.

“Down, girl!” he said.

Yes!

I wagged.  It is very, very hard to train a human.  But sometimes, just sometimes, they can surprise you.

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Review of The Scrambled States of America Talent Show, by Laurie Keller

Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review 0

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The Scrambled States of America Talent Show

by Laurie Keller

Henry Holt, 2008.  36 pages.

http://www.lauriekeller.com/

http://www.henryholtkids.com/

A picture book about the States performing in a talent show?  In her earlier book, Laurie Keller showed what happened when the States got mixed up and tried to find their places again.  The States had so much fun interacting, they decide to hold a talent show.

The result is simply silly, and I can’t resist laughing over it.  Along the way, all kinds of facts about the states are presented, along with lots of inside jokes.

The acts are many and varied.  Delaware names all fifty states in order of statehood while jumping on a pogo stick.  Michigan does a ventriloquist act.  Minnesota saws South Dakota in half (though alert readers will detect that the left half is the color of North Dakota), and Mississippi and Nevada dance the tango.  I especially enjoyed the State Impersonators.  Wyoming and Tennessee impersonated Oklahoma, and Colorado and Florida did a great Idaho impression.

Extra fun was found on the end panels, where Vermont goes around asking states their abbreviations, for example:

“Hi, Hawaii.  What’s your abbreviation?”

“HI.”

“Yeah, hello.  What’s your abbreviation?”

“HI.”

What can I say?  This book struck me funny.  A nice silly approach to learning facts about the states.

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Find this review on the main site at:

www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/scrambled_states_talent_show.html

Review of Knock, Knock!

Delightfully Silly, Humorous, Picture Book Review 0

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Knock, Knock!

Who’s There?

Jokers Welcome!

Jokes by fourteen wacky & talented artists inside!

Dial Books for Young Readers, 2007.  36 pages.

www.penguin.com/youngreaders

Okay, I’m not at all sure you’d want to give this book to any beginner reader that you have to live with!  The knock-knock jokes contained in this book are familiar groaners.  (Aren’t all knock-knock jokes groaners?  I’m curious:  Do they have anything like knock-knock jokes in other languages?  Do any of my readers know?)

The delightful part about this book, and what makes it fun for an adult to read once, is that it celebrates the magnificent art of fourteen exuberant and amazingly talented children’s book illustrators.

The fourteen illustrators featured are Saxton Freymann (Naturally, his knock-knock joke is “Lettuce.”), Tomie DePaola, Dan Yaccarino, Peter H. Reynolds, Sophie Blackall, Yumi Heo, Boris Kulikov, Brett Helquist, Henry Cole, Judy Schachner, Chris Raschka, Laurie Keller, David Small, and Jon J. Muth.

This book is a delight to read through.  And although it can get annoying, it will teach the classic knock-knock jokes every American child should know.

Come on in!

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Find this review on the main site at:

www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/knock_knock.html

Review of Millie in the Snow, by Alexander Steffensmeier

Animal Characters, Christmas, Delightfully Silly, Humorous, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

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Millie in the Snow

by Alexander Steffensmeier

Walker & Company, New York, 2008.  First published in Germany in 2007 as Lieselotte im Schnee.  28 pages.

Starred Review

http://www.walkeryoungreaders.com/

Millie’s back!  Hooray!

Millie the bovine mail carrier stars in a new silly story, this time about Christmas.  Originally written in Germany, I was delighted by the pictures, bringing back memories of German Christmases.

Millie no longer ambushes the mail carrier.  Now she assists him.  At Christmastime, they are busier than ever.  However, Millie has trouble finding her way home in the deep snow, and the packages lose their tags.

Once again, the hilarity of this book is primarily contained in the amazingly expressive illustrations.  As a bonus, along with the exuberantly illustrated main story, there are multiple antics taking place in the background.

Millie is not your typical cow, and this is not your typical Christmas book.

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Find this review on the main site at:

www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/millie_in_the_snow.html

Review of I Will Surprise My Friend! by Mo Willems

Animal Characters, Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review 0

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I Will Surprise My Friend!

by Mo Willems

Hyperion Books for Children, New York, 2008.  57 pages.

Oh, I do love Mo Willems’ books!  I Will Surprise My Friend! is another easy reader about two friends, Elephant (named Gerald) and Piggie.  As with the Pigeon books, Mo Willems manages to convey all kinds of emotions with simple line drawings.  Adding a raised eyebrow here and a pointed toe there tell the readers exactly what the characters are feeling.

I’d like to try this book in a storytime, but it’s particularly suited for a child learning to read.  There are a few words on each page, and the pictures will give the child delight at deciphering exactly what is happening, and they will find it tremendous fun.

To start out, Gerald and Piggie see a squirrel hide behind a rock and surprise his friend.  The two squirrels are delighted.  This gives Gerald a great idea — they can surprise each other at the big rock.

Gerald and Piggie are both fully engaged in the fun of the planned surprise.  But when two people are both hiding, who’s around to get surprised?  There’s plenty of visual humor in this story, and of course the fun of seeing behind the scenes when both friends get surprised in a way they didn’t expect.

Hmm.  Describing it takes more words than are in the book!  I want to find a beginning reader to read this story to me.

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Find this review on the main site at:

www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/i_will_surprise_my_friend.html

Review of Millie Waits for the Mail, by Alexander Steffensmeier

Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review 0

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Millie Waits for the Mail

by Alexander Steffensmeier

Walker & Company, New York, 2007. 

First published in Germany in 2006.

Starred Review.

This book was originally written in German, under the title, Liselotte Lauert.  I want a copy!  This udderly (sorry) silly book was my absolute favorite of the Picture Books chosen for the Summer Reading Program.

Millie the cow waits every morning for her favorite time of day.

Because there was something Millie loved more than anything else —

Scaring the mail carrier. . .  and chasing him off the farm.

Millie spends each morning looking for a new hiding place.  The poor mail carrier has nightmares every night.  The poor farmer has all her packages arrive broken.

Millie must be stopped.

The wonderful silliness of this book (How on earth did Alexander Steffensmeier think of writing a book about a cow scaring the mail carrier?) is especially evident in the illustrations.  The look in Millie’s eye as she scours the farmyard for hiding places is priceless.  The page where Millie first jumps out and scares the mail carrier got a big reaction from the kids every time I showed it to them.  A big reaction from the adults in the room, too.

What can I say?  This book makes me laugh every time I look at it.  It doesn’t promote good, noble purposes.  But it is absolutely, delightfully, wonderfully Silly.

http://www.walkeryoungreaders.com/

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Find this review on the main site at:

www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/millie_waits_for_the_mail.html