Famous Groundhogs Are Ill-Advised...

I live in Pennsylvania, where we have been plagued recently with one more famous groundhog than any state needs. I refer, for the blissfully unaware, to Gus, the spokeshog for the Pennsylvania Lottery, as obnoxious an animatronic creation as has ever been devised. After having to put up with him for too many months now, I don't know whether to appreciate Punxsutawney Phil more after realizing how ridiculous a groundhog can be or to be irritated with him for inspiring this plague upon our televisions. In the spirit of charity, I'll go with the former - though few who have seen the grand ceremony that occurs on February 2 will deny that Phil is quite ludicrous himself.

Gail Gibbons evidently is one of those folks who finds Phil endearing. Her educational picture book about the holiday is entitled Groundhog Day!; the exclamation point screams unfounded enthusiasm. Still, as absurd a celebration as it is, this is a recognized occasion embroiled in tradition, and as such it has educational value. Gibbons is the author-illustrator of dozens of informative picture books, so she's hardly an amateur, and she does pull out some interesting facts.

Readers learn that the holiday stems from ancient Pagan festivals and that the animal that saw its shadow was often of a different species. It wasn't until Europeans began living in Pennsylvania that the groundhog was settled upon as the ideal predictor of weather. The tradition as we know it started in 1886, and the eccentric events surrounding the ceremony at Gobbler's Knob developed since then. After the information about the day, we learn about groundhogs - their size, physical oddities, diet, homes, breeding and other unique features. My favorite page of the book is probably the map of North America featuring several other famous groundhogs scattered across America (and a bit of Canada).

The writing is, unfortunately, very bland and noncommittal, with such sentences as "Lots of people think Groundhog Day is fun," "Many people think a groundhog is cute when it waddles around" and "Sometimes children draw pictures of groundhogs, have snacks, and play games, such as Shadow Tag." I don't find these sentences to be illuminating at all. Moreover, while the groundhogs throughout the book generally come across as fairly cute, the children are corny-looking, and the illustrations in general suffer from a surfeit of squiggly lines.

I think Groundhog Day! would be a good book to include in a classroom library and perhaps read to children of a certain age around the beginning of February. Most children reading it for their own enjoyment, however, will probably put it down again, because for all its educational value, this book is as boring as Gus is an affront to the respectability of Pennsylvanian citizens.