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THE STRANGE AND EXCITING ADVENTURES OF JEREMIAH HUSH by Uri Shulevitz Kirkus Star

THE STRANGE AND EXCITING ADVENTURES OF JEREMIAH HUSH

by Uri Shulevitz

Pub Date: Nov. 1st, 1986
ISBN: 0374336563
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

An elegantly produced animal fantasy by an eminent illustrator. Jeremiah, a large-nosed, middle-aged monkey who lives "on a strange planet curiously resembling our own," is a descendant of C. Runoz de Noserac, famed for nose, sword, and poetry. His three adventures are a trip to the Shake'n'Roll Dancin' Hole, where he is uncomfortably out of place amidst the "ear-deafening noise, faintly resembling music," and the posturing revelers; a quest for his missing umbrella, assisted by one Winchester Bone, P.I., during which he becomes friends with a series of such interesting characters as a retired woodchuck and P.S. Beaver, an architect who has incorporated the umbrella in a charmingly unexpected house which she has constructed of found materials; and winning a pie-eating contest after foiling twin foxes caught trying to cheat by sharing the pie consumption. Shulevitz' 10 beautifully composed black-and-white illustrations perfectly reflect his carefully imagined world, where gentlemanly behavior and gently comical word-play convey a subtly benign philosphy of life. Like Randall Jarrell's lovely tales, this will need to be introduced to children and may not appeal to them all, but should reward those lucky enough to respond to it. It's also the sort of caper adopted by sophisticated adults.