Though the cover depicts a closer alliance than the story ever quite achieves, this take on compromise provides fuel for thought. When neatnik bunny Wally advertises an upstairs apartment for rent, Mae, a huge bear, shoves her way into the house, turns her room into a pigsty and cheerfully gobbles up Wally’s carrot cakes. When Mae invites her many brothers over for a wild party a frustrated Wally at last tries to put his slipper-clad foot down—but instead is swept up in the dancing until he collapses. Tenderly put to bed by his tenant from hell, the next day Wally realizes that he had fun and hops upstairs to push Mae into cleaning up her act a bit. Genial Mae and sibs are appealingly shaggy, massive presences in Weldin’s cleanly drawn scenes, and along with the humor inherent in the characters’ size differential, young readers will appreciate how the lay of Wally’s long ears so clearly telegraphs his ups and downs. The friction disappears a little too easily, but this isn’t exactly The Odd Couple. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-7358-2208-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: NorthSouth
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2008
The wriggly narrator of Diary of a Worm (2003) puts in occasional appearances, but it’s his arachnid buddy who takes center stage here, with terse, tongue-in-cheek comments on his likes (his close friend Fly, Charlotte’s Web), his dislikes (vacuums, people with big feet), nervous encounters with a huge Daddy Longlegs, his extended family—which includes a Grandpa more than willing to share hard-won wisdom (The secret to a long, happy life: “Never fall asleep in a shoe.”)—and mishaps both at spider school and on the human playground. Bliss endows his garden-dwellers with faces and the odd hat or other accessory, and creates cozy webs or burrows colorfully decorated with corks, scraps, plastic toys and other human detritus. Spider closes with the notion that we could all get along, “just like me and Fly,” if we but got to know one another. Once again, brilliantly hilarious. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-06-000153-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Joanna Cotler/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2005
Rylant (Henry and Mudge and the Sneaky Crackers, 1998, etc.) slips into a sentimental mode for this latest outing of the boy and his dog, as she sends Mudge and Henry and his parents off on a camping trip. Each character is attended to, each personality sketched in a few brief words: Henry's mother is the camping veteran with outdoor savvy; Henry's father doesn't know a tent stake from a marshmallow fork, but he's got a guitar for campfire entertainment; and the principals are their usual ready-for-fun selves. There are sappy moments, e.g., after an evening of star- gazing, Rylant sends the family off to bed with: ``Everyone slept safe and sound and there were no bears, no scares. Just the clean smell of trees . . . and wonderful green dreams.'' With its nice tempo, the story is as toasty as its campfire and swaddled in Stevenson's trusty artwork. (Fiction. 6-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-689-81175-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1998
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