Underground Gopher Steps Into the Light in Winnie the Pooh: Working Together

Gopher is mildly controversial among Winnie the Pooh fans because he is a Disney invention, having been introduced in Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree so that there would be a distinctly American character (and an excuse for several meta jokes involving the fact that he’s “not in the book.”) I love Pooh in all forms, but my favorite version and what constitutes my own personal canon is the Saturday morning cartoon The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, in which Gopher (Michael Gough) is a vital part of life in the Hundred-Acre Wood and actually appears in more episodes than Christopher Robin, Kanga, Roo, Owl and even Eeyore. For me, then, this industrious digger with the mild speech impediment has a very important place in Pooh lore, so I was happy to see so much of him in the video Winnie the Pooh: Working Together, part of the Learning collection of videos featuring episodes from the series.

Shovel, Shovel, Toil and Trouble - Gopher is heavily involved in each of the three episodes on this video, but his presence here is most pronounced as he giddily receives a shiny new power shovel he dubs Lucille. There’s a blush-worthy romantic fervor to his actions wherever Lucille is concerned, and in his blind passion, he tears around the Hundred-Acre Wood digging unwanted swimming pools and basements, wreaking havoc with the homes of his friends. Only Piglet (John Fiedler) sympathizes with his plight, but even he begins to think Gopher has gone too far when he comes home to find his house submerged. It’s up to this timid soul to put a stop to Gopher’s shenanigans without hurting his feelings. A great showcase for both Gopher and Piglet.

Tigger’s Shoes - In this episode, Tigger (Paul Winchell) is the one driving everyone, most notably Rabbit (Ken Sansom), up a wall. In an effort to keep him occupied, he challenges Tigger to reach the top of the dizzyingly high Castle Ridge in a single bounce. When Tigger fails to accomplish the task, he begs Rabbit for help training, prompting the persnickety bunny to play a rather mean prank that involves loading down a “special” pair of sneakers with nuts and bolts so Tigger will lose confidence in his own abilities. Gopher’s role here is mostly as advisor to Rabbit as he tries to make him feel guilty for his actions. This is a great episode for fans of Tigger or Rabbit, and the visual spectacle of the towering cliff is truly grand.

Easy Come, Easy Gopher - Once again, Rabbit is irritated, this time because Gopher’s plans for the fabled Ultimate Tunnel of his grandpappy’s dreams interfere with his house. When the opportunity presents itself, he changes Gopher’s schematics, not realizing that Gopher’s tunnel will now disrupt all of the other homes in the Wood. As in the second episode, we eventually have a remorseful Rabbit as he realizes that his meddling has only made the problem worse. Beyond the spirit of togetherness and forgiveness pervading the end of the episode, I love this one because of the brief introduction, via a tall tale, to Gopher’s grandpappy, who actually comes to the Hundred-Acre Wood himself in one of my favorite episodes of the series.

It’s very rare for an episode to incorporate all ten of the primary characters in the series, and in this case, none of the three episodes includes Eeyore, Kanga, Roo, Owl or Christopher Robin. While fans of those characters may be disappointed, those who come down on the side of Gopher will be satisfied with this video that emphasizes the importance of forgiveness and compromise.

A Little Girl Celebrates an Old-Fashioned Hallowe'en With Her Grandparents in Pumpkin Moonshine

When I went to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter earlier this year, one of the beverages for sale was pumpkin juice. I didn’t try it, preferring to stick with butterbeer; frankly, drinking pumpkin sounded a bit gross to me. Nonetheless, it is probably the second-most famous drink in the Harry Potter universe. When I came across Tasha Tudor’s Pumpkin Moonshine, I thought the subject would be a similar drink, but with more of a kick. It seemed an odd subject for a picture book, but that just intrigued me all the more.

As I started to read, it further surprised me that the character intending to make Pumpkin Moonshine was a little girl visiting her grandparents. Was this really a story about a pint-sized moonshiner? What sort of drunken revelry would follow?

By the time I reached the end of the book, I realized that I had misunderstood. This is not a story involving potent potables. Instead, it is just about a child eager to make a jack-o-lantern. A quick Google search seems to indicate that this terminology is an invention of Tudor’s, or at least a very obscure name. Was she trying to celebrate an old family tradition or be provocative with her title? There’s certainly nothing else provocative about the book.

Tudor’s dedication reads “a wee story for a very sweet wee person.” This is a small square book with light orange trim forming a thick border around each page. Each page on the left features a watercolor painting rendered in muted tones, while the right-hand page includes a paragraph that begins with the first letter in orange and set apart, large and in an orange calligraphy box. The black ink sketches seen here are thoroughly charming. None of the pages is very wordy; three sentences are the most any one of them has, and in those cases, at least one of the sentences is fairly short.

The main character, Sylvie Ann, is a cute little girl who looks like a short-haired, bonneted Alice in Wonderland. She is visiting her grandparents in Connecticut; Tudor doesn’t tell us what year this is, but it seems pretty old-fashioned, and I would estimate the date to be at some point in the 1800s. At one point she says that Sylvie and the dog Wiggy “puff like steam engines.” The landscape is bucolic and unspoiled, with just a few hand-built structures dotting the farmland, and the spelling of the word Hallowe’en further suggests an older setting.

This is a charming little slice of life tale whose main event is the pumpkin Sylvie selects rolling down a hill. Various types of livestock scatter, and Mr. Hemmelskamp, an elderly neighbor who reminds me of the grandfather in Heidi, gets knocked for a loop. It’s mildly comical, but the writing style is pretty matter-of-fact. What’s more, after all the trouble she goes to so she can “make” her Pumpkin Moonshine, she only empties the pumpkin; her grandfather does the actual carving. Of course, that is probably for the best; small children and sharp knives don’t make a great combination.

This book was published in 1958 and feels older than that. Some children may find it too old-fashioned, but Pumpkin Moonshine offers an appealing peek at a Halloween celebration of yesteryear.

A Family Teams Up to Turn an Accident Into a Blessing in The Runaway Pumpkin

In Tasha Tudor’s 1958 book Pumpkin Moonshine, a young girl selects a pumpkin to carve into a jack-o-lantern and then chases it as it rolls down a hill, disrupting livestock and upsetting property until it comes to a rest and her grandparents help her do something fun with it. This is also the basic story in Kevin Lewis’s The Runaway Pumpkin, illustrated by S. D. Schindler.

I don’t suppose that Lewis was influenced by Tudor’s tale; after all, a pumpkin rolling down a hill is not a difficult image to come up with. Still, with the farmland, the grandparents and the mild destruction the pumpkin causes, there are definite similarities. However, this 2003 book has a more contemporary setting. Instead of one child, there are three, and all of them are in costume. Additionally, instead of prose, this story is told in verse.

As someone who has devoted a lot of time to trying to perfect my scansion, I can’t help noticing how little attention is paid to it in many children’s books. This one isn’t too bad; it’s a bit clunky in places, but for the most part, it reads pretty well. Lewis employs some useful repetition as he has each member of the family think of a different delicacy made by Granny when the pumpkin rolls by. This sets us up for the book’s cheerful conclusion. He also repeats a sonically satisfying series of adjectives describing the pumpkin as it rolls.

The sheer size of the pumpkin is likely to elicit giggles from young readers. The thing is really a monstrosity, though it is almost perfectly round. The way that Poppa stops the pumpkin in its tracks is quite clever. It would be nice if the kids were involved in the resolution of this problem, but the sense of the whole family pulling together is sweet. This is definitely a tale of family togetherness, and the costumes that each member of the family wears as they gather around the table for a cozy celebration add to the fun. I especially like the complicated insect costume that Grampa dons.

Schindler’s illustrations are in muted tones but are full of vivid detail. He provides a series of two-page spreads with the text printed over the paint in a playful font, and these paintings set us very firmly in autumn and also show how much trouble one pumpkin is capable of causing. I think my favorite illustration may be the one that shows Grampa on the ground, shaking his fist at the pumpkin that has just knocked him over, while white chickens scatter in a flurry of feathers.

The ordinary pumpkin in Pumpkin Moonshine stirs things up a bit, but this jumbo-sized would-be jack-o-lantern really makes a mess. This is a silly story with a warm thread of family giving it a heartening ending. Of the two, I think I give this one just a bit of an edge for both excitement and sentimentality. The pumpkin runs away, but great things happen when it stops.

Trixie Trades Knuffle for Knuffels in Mo Willems' Knuffle Bunny Free

Prolific and much-lauded writer-illustrator Mo Willems has created several popular series, including the Pigeon books and the Elephant and Piggie books, but his Knuffle Bunny trilogy holds an unusual place in his canon because it is best read in order. Each book finds the main character, Trixie, at a different stage of her childhood, with her world expanding considerably each time. In the first book, she remains in her neighborhood and interacts only with her parents, and she takes her first plunge into comprehensible speech. In the second, she has mastered verbal communication and spends her days at preschool among other children her age, eventually making her first close friend outside the family. In the third book, she is a confident elementary school student off on an international voyage to see her grandparents. From a trip to the Laundromat to a trip to Holland, her adventures are steadily getting bigger.

Trixie remains just as attached to Knuffle Bunny, her dowdy stuffed rabbit, as she was in the first volume, so of course, she brings him along with her for the big trip, counting on having him to cuddle with during her very first airplane flight. Unfortunately, as anyone who has read the first two books knows, she’s not so skilled at hanging on to her treasured toy. On this occasion, she won’t be able to instantly retrieve him; she leaves him behind on the plane, and by the time she realizes what she’s done, the plane is gone, and Knuffle Bunny is off for a voyage around the world. Will she ever see him again? And how will she get along without him in the meantime?

Willems once remarked in an interview that the word Knuffle is an adaptation of Knuffel, the Dutch word for snuggle, so it seems quite fitting that the last book should find Trixie in Holland, snuggling with her Oma and Opa in her beloved bunny’s absence. Most of the book takes place there, which makes it educational for children as well as entertaining. As with the previous books, this is a mixed-media effort, with black-and-white photographs serving as backgrounds for colorful hand-drawn characters. Kids can wander the Dutch streets with Trixie as she eats at a café and poses in front of an authentic windmill, and they can gasp along with her at the garish pink Dutch-spouting robo-bunny her grandparents buy her in an effort to ease her malaise at losing Knuffle Bunny, seemingly for good this time.

Additionally, in a four-page fold-out spread, Willems offers a peek at some of the other places Knuffle Bunny might end up in his travels, showing him in eight very different locations. I wish that Willems had identified these places in a note in the back, but kids can still have fun trying to figure out what country they are seeing; it just might take a little more work for parents to confirm the accuracy of their guesses.

While all three books contain a mix of the humorous and the emotionally resonant, I would say that the first book is primarily funny, while the second is equally touching and comical. I would deem the third book the least funny of the three and the most poignant. We don’t know precisely how old Trixie is here; I would guess at least seven, and possibly as old as ten. She’s old enough to have a real awareness of how her life is changing, and that scares and saddens her. However, it also excited her, and by the end of the book, she has come to embrace the new possibilities that come with being a big kid.

Most of the pages in this book have a beige background, and while a few characters are drawn directly on the page, most are set within a photographic panel, with a majority of pages having between one and three. As always, Willems does a lot with a little. One of my favorite parts of this book is the series of panels in which Trixie, having realized that her bunny is gone, heads off to inform her father, who is busy enjoying a pleasant chat with his dad, a charming fellow with a thick gray beard, square spectacles and a bald head. In four pictures, we see him go from relaxed to on-edge to staring at Trixie to assuming a hopeless face-palm position. “Trixie didn’t tell her daddy that Knuffle Bunny was gone,” Willems writes. “She didn’t have to.” This is especially striking given that the central conflict of the first book hinges on Trixie’s inability to communicate with her dad and his obliviousness to the source of her distress. Just as Trixie is growing up, her dad is maturing as a father and learning to be more attuned to his daughter.

Like the first two books, Knuffle Bunny Free, a sweet, heart-tugging play on words, includes an epilogue, and this one drives home the fact that the Knuffle Bunny series will end with number three. I’ll admit I got a little teary as I read those last four pages, which are written directly to the real Trixie as Willems imagines what the next decade or two may hold in store for her. The book proper also ends with a letter, leaving the reader with a real sense of the power that words have to connect people. Perhaps children who read this may be inspired to begin correspondences of their own: with their grandparents, with each other, with distant pen pals they have yet to meet. They might even decide to write the author himself, which he encourages by posting his mailing address in the FAQ section of his website, www.mowillems.com.

The Knuffle Bunny trilogy is the continuing story of a pudgy plush rabbit that is always getting lost. It’s the story of two adults, especially one overwhelmed dad, learning how to be better parents. But mostly, it’s the story of Trixie, a girl who is gradually growing older and taller and wiser and kinder. The first two are pretty much unavoidable; the second two are just a shade easier to achieve when children read such edifying books as Mo Willems’ Knuffle Bunny series.

Allan Say Describes Having One Foot in Two Worlds in Grandfather's Journey

“Leavin’, it never is easy. There’s no place like home’s what they say…” So begins Ryan Kelly’s The Village That They Call the Moy, a wistful song about emigration and love of one’s hometown. Homesickness is a thread weaving its way through much of Irish folk music, but it’s certainly not unique to immigrants from the Emerald Isle. In the picture book Grandfather’s Journey, Allen Say poignantly describes his grandfather’s experience of exploring the world and making a home in two different countries, with the result that he always was yearning for one while he was in the other.

Say has written other books reflecting his Japanese-American heritage, including Tree of Cranes, which describes a Christmas celebration that incorporates Japanese traditions. In Grandfather’s Journey, Say presents his grandfather as an adventurous young man eager to experience all that America had to offer. With just a sentence or two per page, he conveys the exhilaration of discovery that his grandpa experienced. Eventually, that gives way to nostalgia, to longing for the land of his childhood. So throughout the book there is a gentle tug of war, with both Japan and the United States – particularly California – staking a claim on his heart.

Say’s paintings are realistic and rich in detail. In the first portion of the book, we feel as though we are making the thrilling journey along with his grandpa, with windswept fields, shadowy mountains and towering cliffs all capturing the imagination. America feels wild and unexplored, while there’s a sense of familiarity in the paintings set in Japan. Say does an excellent job of portraying the sense of returning to one’s roots. In addition to the beautiful landscapes, there is his grandfather himself, who we see grow older and whose face often betrays a sense of wistfulness.

This is a finely crafted book that is a bit on the tall side, so it might not fit easily on some shelves, but it would make an excellent addition to a classroom or school library. It has educational value as it provides a glimpse into the immigrant experience, and it does so by encouraging children to see the world through the eyes of Say’s grandfather. Additionally, the connection between the author/narrator and the main character might inspire young readers to talk to their grandparents or other elderly relatives and friends about their experiences.

In Grandfather’s Journey, Say has created a succinct but lovely tribute to his grandfather and, by extension, to all those who have loved more than one home and find themselves forever torn in two. No matter what your cultural background, this Caldecott Award-winning book is an excellent exploration of the ties one immigrant feels to each place he has lived.

Grandmas and Grandpas Both Give Their Best to Their Grandkids

So many children are fortunate enough to have grandparents who can dote on them and teach them about the world. In What Grandmas Do Best / What Grandpas Do Best, Laura Numeroff and illustrator Lynn Munsinger explore the power of this bond. Both Numeroff and Munsinger have numerous books to their credit, most involving animals. This one is especially simplistic, especially on Numeroff’s end, but I like the clever concept behind the book. It’s not the sort of book that seems likely to demand frequent repeat readings, but it would make a nice addition to a child’s shelf.

There are only 12 sentences in this book - and six of them are exactly the same as the other six, with the exception of one word. Half of the book shows all the things that Grandmas can do; the other half, which is read by turning the book upside down and opening the book from the opposite cover, has to do with grandpas’ activities. And what do you know? They’re the same things. This encourages a sense of gender equality and allows for some fun as we see how the grandpas and grandmas approach the same things differently.

At the same time, it makes for a rather uninvolved book, especially since ten of the twelve sentences begin “Grandmas / Grandpas can...” And the last sentence in each half of the book merely delays that opening with an introductory clause. The first five sentences in each half contain three activities per sentence, with each activity on a separate page. This makes the format very predictable and a bit stilted, since there is no variety in the sentence structure.

However, while Numeroff might be accused of sacrificing creativity for structure here, Munsinger’s illustrations are engaging as always. For each of the ten initial sentences, Munsinger provides three illustrations of the same child-grandparent pair. Hence, we feel like we’re getting a bit of a peek into the lives of ten different families. Most pictures show only the child and the grandparent, always working and playing together in close quarters.

The final page of each half, meanwhile, shows all five pairs scattered around a white page. Perhaps the most engaging of the illustrations are actually the two-page spreads immediately inside the book, which bring all the characters into close proximity with each other in a couple of outdoorsy scenes. There’s even some interaction among them, as the dogs and pigs on the Grandpa side share an umbrella and the raccoons and mice on the Grandma side work together to build a sandcastle.

The unique layout of the book, coupled with the adorable illustrations, makes it a cute choice for very young children to read with their own grandparents. It might even spark an idea or two about what they can do on their next outing, and perhaps reading it will inspire a brand-new grandparent-grandchild portrait. While this is not the most complex project either Numeroff or Munsinger has taken on, What Grandmas Do Best / What Grandpas Do Best is a very cute tribute to the love that grandparents and grandchildren share.

A Baby Brother Brings Confusion in Junie B. Jones and A Little Monkey Business

During my years of working at a bookstore, I have become very familiar with the popularity of Barbara Park's Junie B. Jones series, but until the other day, I had never actually read beyond the back-cover blurb. When my friend Libbie picked up a couple of the books at a block sale, I got my first full dose of Junie B., a sort of latter-day Ramona Quimby. The books are divided into chapters and run about 60 pages each, but the large print and the many illustrations make them easy for an adult to devour in well under an hour. I began my immersion with Junie B. Jones and A Little Monkey Business, the second book in the series.

In the first 17 Junie B. Jones books, the protagonist is a spunky kindergartener. While Beverly Clearly gets readers into Ramona's head, those books are still written in the third person, while Junie narrates these stories herself. That means that there is a lot of improper grammar, as Junie isn't anywhere near mastery of the English language yet. It also means that everything is filtered through her limited understanding. Denise Brunkus's illustrations are detailed and full of expression, and Junie herself is usually the focus of them. Aside from the cover art, these pictures are all in black and white.

Monkey Business opens with Junie reacting to her parents' announcement that they have a surprise for her. It's a rather troubling scene because it is reminiscent of a typical day in the Dursley household in the Harry Potter books, with spoiled young Dudley ranting and raving because he wants something and it isn't being delivered quickly enough for his liking. When Junie hears "surprise," she thinks "present," and when it turns out that what her parents have instead is news of an impending baby, she behaves in a manner that is most unbecoming.

Later in the book, after Junie has adjusted to the idea of sharing her home with a sibling, she encourages a bidding war between her best friends Lucille and Grace, both of whom want to be the first to see her newborn brother. Lucille, who comes from an affluent family, is the one who plants the idea in her head by offering Junie temporary ownership of her locket in exchange for first dibs. Junie thinks that allowing Grace the chance to pay her off as well is only fair, though of course it would have been better to tell both girls that they could see her brother soon, no charge. This scene reminds me of Tom Sawyer's fence-painting con, in which the rascal manages to make his chore sound so appealing that his friends start paying him whatever they can find for the privilege of participating. It ceases to be funny, however, as Junie begins to feel that she is entitled to everything of value that both of her friends possess, whether it's fancy new shoes or snack tickets. The tantrum and the extortion are the most unseemly moments in the book.

Junie is more willfully naughty than Ramona. However, some of the mistakes that she makes are simple misunderstandings that become magnified when coupled with her forceful personality. The biggest misunderstanding in this book has to do with idioms and serves as a reminder that for those just learning the language, these phrases can be very confusing. In this instance, Junie's grandma describes the new baby as a "cute little monkey" with long fingers and loads of dark hair, which leads Junie to believe that her brother is literally a monkey. I thought this was a clever premise on which to hang a story, and I liked the compassionate, level-headed way the principal responds to the situation, turning an embarrassing mistake into a learning experience for everyone.

My favorite character aside from the principal is Frank Miller, Junie's grandpa. We don't see him very much, but he's a warm and funny man who seems especially adept at understanding how a kid's mind works. He makes her waffles and plays games with her, and because of his attention, Junie is too busy having fun to feel left out of the birth process. I have a vivid recollection of waking up in the middle of the night in September of 1988 to the sight of my grandparents; when I asked if the baby had been born yet, Grandpa assured me, "Well, he's thinkin' about it!" He didn't live to see my brother's first birthday, so I'm especially glad that we were able to share such a landmark event.

Now that I've read a couple of books in Park's series, I would say that they're not nearly as classic as Cleary's books. For one thing, there are many more of them, with nearly 30 in the series so far as opposed to eight Ramona books. For another, they are considerably shorter, and some are likely to find the writing style annoying. Additionally, Junie's behavior tends to be a little bit more intentionally bratty than Ramona's.

On the other hand, the books are very funny, and Junie usually walks away from her latest adventure wiser in some way, and perhaps chastened. The principal is a great example of a school administrator who truly cares about the students in his care and strikes a good balance between strict and understanding in dealing with transgressions. Moreover, as Junie discovers new words, she passes her knowledge onto readers with custom definitions that entertain as they inform, which reminded me a bit of Lemony Snicket.

I'd recommend these books for young readers, preferably a little bit older than Junie so they will come into it with a solid understanding of what constitutes appropriate behavior, especially in school. In any case, I advise parents to familiarize themselves with the stories so that even if the children read them on their own, some frank parent-child discussions can follow. Junie has many lessons to teach, but most are by negative example, so it's important to talk about why some of the things she does are out of line and what might be a better way of handling the situation. As long as young readers approach it with that spirit, Junie B. Jones and A Little Monkey Business is a bundle of fun.

Old Friends Have a Great Time in This Inter-Generational Henry and Mudge Adventure

I love Henry and Mudge, the young boy and enormous dog who star in Cynthia Rylant's beginning reader series of the same name. But I love Mr. Putter and Tabby, the main characters in another of Rylant's easy reader series, even more. Rylant just makes the elderly Mr. Putter so endearing, and Arthur Howard's irresistible illustrations sweeten the deal. It's encouraging that a series for young children can focus on grandparent-aged characters and flourish. It's nice to see this inter-generational sensitivity show up in the Henry and Mudge series, and apparently I'm not the only one who thinks so because Henry and Mudge and the Great Grandpas, the twenty-sixth book in the series, received the 2006 Theodore Seuss Geisel Award for the most distinguished beginning reader book.

This 35-page book is broken up into four section: Grandpas, A Pond!, Skivvies and Full and Happy. The beginning explains how Henry's Great-Grandpa Bill lives in a big house with several other grandpas. It doesn't seem to be a nursing home, since we see no one there but the five old men who so look forward to Henry and Mudge's visits; it's evidently more of a Golden Girls situation, with most of the men comparable in age to spit-fire Sophia.

While the men appear to live very comfortably, the visits from Henry's family are especially happy times. Henry is very fond of all five men, and he's considerate, bringing them books, magazines, candy, decks of cards and crossword puzzles when he visits. He often joins them in games of poker or checkers, while Mudge simply drools and lets the grandpas hug him as much as they want. And while Henry's parents sit down to chat with Great-Grandpa Bill and his friends, Henry and Mudge can run off and explore the woods nearby.

Sucie Stevenson once again illustrates this book, and although her style is cartoonish as ever, she does a great job impressing upon us the beauty of the forest where Henry and Mudge go wandering, especially the gently rippling pond. She does an even better job of helping us get to know each of the grandpas as individuals. Though we don't learn the names of the others, each has a distinctive look. One wears a Hawaiian shirt, and his little remaining hair is brown. Another has a long face and a ball cap. The third has dark skin and a bristly white mustache, while the fourth has a dapper green hat, a bow tie and tufts of gray hair. His own grandpa has a long white beard and matching mustache and wears a straw hat. All five sport spectacles. On one page, we get a glimpse of what these men where like when they were young, each with a different job. It's all very much geared toward getting young readers to appreciate that these men are more than just old. They're people, with rich histories and plenty of life still in them.

Their vivacity is best demonstrated toward the end of the book, when Henry's discovery of a pond results in a swimming outing for the whole gang - except Mom, who Henry forbids to come along because the men are swimming in their "skivvies". Though it takes a while for them to walk to the pond, and once they're there, they have to use Mudge as a raft now and then as their strength fades, there's ultimately little difference between this assembly and a crew of rowdy boys playing in the water hole. Incidentally, Henry's parents always seem to give Henry an exceptionally free rein; it's a bit comforting to see where their boundaries are (in this case, "no swimming alone") and how well Henry respects them.

Henry and Mudge and the Great Grandpas is a tender story about respect and affection spanning the generations, and its award is well deserved if it encourages youngsters to seek out the inner child in the elders of their acquaintance.

Little Critter Plus Two Grandparents Equals Big Fun

Growing up, I always got a kick out of Little Critter, the adorable spiky-haired creature Mercer Mayer dreamed up for an extensive series of picture books. I don't think he's supposed to be any particular type of animal, though I suppose he slightly resembles a porcupine. But he is a new species created by Mayer with furry features that make him more endearing but all the personality and trappings of a young boy.

In Bye-Bye, Mom and Dad, we get not only Little Critter but also a hefty dose of his sister and grandparents. His parents have gone away on a trip, so Grandma and Grandpa come to visit while they're away. With typical enthusiasm, Little Critter relates all the highlights of their day, though sometimes his description of events differs from what actually happens according to Mayer's vibrant illustrations - or at least he leaves out or understates some of the sordid details.

For instance, he tells us that when he helped his grandpa do some painting, he spilled the paint "a little"; the illustration shows a bucket of paint knocked over, its yellow contents seeping into the grass in a wide stream. Later, we learn that he gave his grandma a hand with her bowling ball "because it was too heavy"; he manages to lob it over into the next lane, much to the irritation of the other bowlers. My favorite of these slight misrepresentations occurs at the end, however, when Little Critter tells us how he spooked his grandparents so soundly with his story-telling skills that they begged to sleep with him for the night, after checking nervously for monsters in the closet.

While the Critter family is of ambiguous biology, there are several recognizable species that pop up throughout this book. First off, there's the dog, the mouse and the spider that appear on most pages; these are Little Critter's pets, and they generally reflect whatever emotions he is experiencing at the moment. We also see a squirrel in its natural environment. Meanwhile, we get a rhino grocer and a walrus concessions attendant, while fellow theatergoers and bowlers include a hippo, a giraffe, a crocodile, a bear and an elephant.

This is a cute, easy-to-read book. With just a sentence or two per page and so much colorful detail in each of the pictures, early readers should embrace this little fella, his lively sister and his doting grandparents, while adults can appreciate the subtle humor evident in the slight difference between written and visual accounts. When the parents are away, the critter will play; get in on the fun with Bye-Bye, Mom and Dad.