A TICKET TO KALAMAZOO!

Layton’s sketchy portraits of active, popeyed children and creatures animate a slender gathering of verse.

Though undeniably zippy as advertised, the 19 poems here vary widely in quality of both execution and presentation. Carter starts off with a pair of lively but ordinary fingerplays (“Four little fingers / add one thumb - / and what / have you got…? / A handful / of FUN!”) and a title poem that, in order to fit its allotted spread, confusingly leaves the recurrent chorus to be filled in by readers after the first iteration. The author goes on to follow a “Scratch & Sniff Bear” down and up a mountain, string together several unchallenging puzzle poems, compile a recipe for “Night Soup,” and finish with verse about space, hugs, and being happy. Aside from a few bright spots, like a catalog of “Busy Bugs”—“wiggly bugs / that hide in sand / tickly bugs / that like your hand”—the rhyming runs the gamut from arbitrary to uninspired: “Fancy a ride on an ELEPHANT?/ What a hoot it’ll be, all tickety-boo / when you’re on board, so come on you!” “I whizz ’round / Jupiter, Saturn and / the sun. Yeah, / I’m a little / alien, life is fun!” Layton depicts a brown-skinned young wheelchair user having a “Conversation With a Fly,” and others of diverse skin color peer at bugs or hold out hands. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

Slim pickings for personal or public performance.