RUTHIE BON BAIR

Ruthie Bon Bair will NOT dry her long hair, and soon she discovers there are mushrooms up there! Then lush ferns, then moss, lily pads and a froggie—there’s hardly a thing not a-bloom on her noggie. No grown-up can fix her, not mom, doc or plant guy, and the hairdresser fails, so Ruth gives it her own try. Since mushrooms and fern things won’t grow when it snows, wet-haired in her nightie, outdoors Ruthie goes. Plants droop, Ruthie blow-dries, but still all’s not well—there’s more of this hair-raising story to tell. Our crinkle-haired friend and her leaden-eyed cohorts now face a new growth of the warm, dry locale sort. This claims to be writ in the Seuss-y tradition, but that only comes to a lukewarm fruition. Comic pictures are drawn with those pencils of color, but one pretty much looks a lot like another. If you’ve got a hankerin’ for stories of hair, try Franny B. Kranny (2001) or Bedhead (2000) to share. (Picture book. 4-8)