GIMME CRACKED CORN & I WILL SHARE

Cornball comedy guaranteed to pun-ish your funny bone. One night Chicken has a dream about a treasure of cracked corn buried under a great pink pig. He tells his friend George, who says, “You must be yolking!,” but the next day they set off to find the barn. Even though it’s “Fry-Day,” they dare to cross the road and escape a cat and a hawk attack. They travel all night and when the sunny side comes up, they find the barn and the great pink pig who asks why they want the corn. “Because it’s what chickens grow on,” says George. The pig replies, “I thought they grew on egg-plants.” O’Malley hatches every fowl joke and riddle and then some. His deep-black-ink line illustrations with scanned-in color scratch in an etching-like texture and are egg-ceedingly entertaining. Details in the drawings play off the balloon dialogue, e.g., a bakery sign advertises “Coop Cakes.” Scramble together bits of the comic cartoon picture books by M.J. Auch with pieces of the egg-zagerated humor of the movie Chicken Run and season with the wacky wit of Doreen Cronin and you have a frittata of fun. (Picture book. 5-9)