These Cows Are Driving Everyone Crazy!

When I watched the first season of Smallville, I was able to suspend my disbelief for X-ray eyes, super speed, indestructibility and all of Clark Kent's other unusual attributes. However, there was one complaint I just couldn't help but voice: "Why is this 14-year-old driving?" It all comes, I suppose, of living on a farm on the outskirts of a tiny town where driving the tractor is second nature by the age of ten. Still, as much as that corn-fed plaid wearer may have gone for a pre-teen pleasure cruise or two unhindered, I somehow doubt Pa Kent would have extended the relaxed rules to the bovines who helped provide his livelihood.

Of course, neither does the farmer in Sakes Alive! A Cattle Drive, but those darn cows just up and help themselves to his pick-up anyway after swiping his keys. Presumably this whole book was inspired by the term "cattle drive," which certainly takes on a different meaning here as Molly and Mabel, the mischievous mooers on the run a la Thelma and Louise, tear across the countryside, provoking panic and the repeated refrain of "Sakes alive!"

Having previously read Karma Wilson's Bear Snores On, Bear Stays Up For Christmas and Bear Wants More, I expected a series of breezy, aesthetically pleasing verses, and I was not disappointed. For instance: "They bounced along the bumpy road / at quite a frightful speed. / 'What's that sign say?' Mabel asked. / But cows, of course, can't read." Later, Wilson reminds us that they can't write either. But somehow or another, they can drive - and, just as impressive, fit into the seats in the truck, which I can't imagine would be too accommodating to even the daintiest of dairy cows.

The magnificently silly book owes much to illustrator Karla Firehammer as well. The pictures, which are done in acrylics, have a soft, pastel look to them; I especially like the purple trees and the turquoise truck, which looks like a perfect hippie-mobile when it winds up decorated by a shower of flowers. There is great attention to detail in the illustrations, which are populated with a cast of characters that grows considerably large by the end. The adorable citizens of this town all look a bit like Fisher Price Little People: the overall-clad farmer with a straw hat, the mustache-wearing sheriff in his smart blue uniform, the hopping mad little mayor who could almost pass for the Monopoly Man, the bespectacled dog walker in the green jacket... Even when some of these folks are roused into a nasty temper by the cows' antics, they are entertaining rather than intimidating.

Fanciful and clever, Sakes Alive! A Cattle Drive is such a giggle-fest that I might not recommend it for bedtime reading because it is likely to wind kids up rather than down. But any other time of day, this hilarious book about a pair of cows on the lam will drive youngsters wild with delight.