I Am Going! (An Elephant and Piggie Book) [Hardcover]

Mo Willems (Author, Illustrator)

Book Description

Age Level: 4 and up | Grade Level: P and up | Series: Elephant and Piggie

Gerald is careful. Piggie is not. Piggie cannot help smiling. Gerald can.

Gerald and Piggie are best friends.

In I Am Going!, Piggie ruins a perfectly good day by telling Gerald she is going. If Piggie goes, who will Gerald skip with, play Ping-Pong with, and wear silly hats with?

Willems's Geisel Award–winning duo continues to delight readers with their silly shenanigans. Packed full of humor and heart, the Elephant & Piggie Books are vetted by an early-learning specialist and early learners themselves, so they'll be right on target for new readers.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

PreSchool-Grade 1—Once again, Willems shows his talent for distilling the most profound human emotions to just a few words. Gerald the elephant is exhibiting anxiety, and his issue is the fact that Piggie says, "I am going!" For young children, this fear of abandonment can surface even when a friend or caretaker leaves for a brief time. It turns out that Piggie is just planning to go get lunch, and in his typical, reassuring way, Willems shows a picnic spread at the end with the two friends enjoying the meal together, Gerald's worries having been assuaged. Fans of the series will recognize that sometimes Gerald is the in-charge character and sometimes it is Piggie; as in real life, different people show their vulnerabilities in different situations. Once again, Willems uses just two colors, showing pink Piggie marching on the front endpapers and gray Gerald hopping on the back. He uses text bubbles to indicate who is speaking and includes plenty of white space. The illustrations are hilarious while at the same time capturing the truest of feelings. Be sure to add this easy reader to your collection as an addition to the series or even as a stand-alone.—Gloria Koster, West School, New Canaan, CT
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From Booklist

The mercurial friendship of Elephant and Piggie survives another minor (but seemingly life-ending!) tiff. The two are basking in shared bliss when Piggie announces, “Well, I am going.” Elephant proceeds to get histrionic, clawing at his ears and wailing, “Who will I skip with? Who will I play Ping-Pong with? Who will I wear a silly hat with? WHO WILL I SKIP AND PLAY PING-PONG IN A SILLY HAT WITH?!?!” Though it falls short of the high-water marks of I Love My New Toy! (2008) and I Will Surprise My Friend! (2008), Willems again distills the abrupt melodrama summoned by the commonest of childhood disagreements. As always, the key is the offhandedness of the presentation—the pencil art, the simple font, and the generous white space create a mid-tempo visual rhythm that is somehow intrinsically funny. This austerity is broken when Elephant reaches the mad heights of his tantrum. For both adult and child readers, it’s a moment as pleasurably predictable as the making-up that quickly follows. Preschool-Grade 2. --Daniel Kraus

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 4 and up
  
• Hardcover: 64 pages
• Publisher: Hyperion Book CH; 1 edition (January 26, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1423119908
• ISBN-13: 978-1423119906
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.8 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #22,322 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #13 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Children's Books > Animals > Elephants > Fiction
  • #20 in Books > Children's Books > Animals > Elephants
  • #36 in Books > Children's Books > Animals > Pigs

More About the Author

A three-time Caldecott Honor winner for Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!, Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale, and Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity, Mo Willems has also won two Geisel Medals for There is a Bird on Your Head! and Are You Ready to Play Outside? And his books are perennial New York Times bestsellers. Before he turned to children's books, Mo was a writer and animator on Sesame Street, where he won six Emmy Awards. Mo lives with his family in Massachusetts.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Wow., February 6, 2010

By 

Ulyyf "Connie" (NYC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: I Am Going! (An Elephant and Piggie Book) (Hardcover)

I love Mo Willems. I really, really do.

And you know what? I love Elephant and Piggie. These books work on so many levels. First and foremost, they work well in their job, which is "easy reader". They ARE easy to read... but not too easy. And while the illustrations do illustrate the plot (and very funnily, I might add), they don't give away the plot. Children have to actually read the words to know what the book says instead of guessing from the context of the pictures. And best of all, the books are SO funny and SO over the top that even the most reluctant reader has to ham it up when reading, they can't help it! So when reading, kids are avoiding that terrible, horrible drone-of-boredom so many of them cultivate.

These books also function well as read alouds because they're so funny. Try reading Dick and Jane aloud. You can't do it. (If you're going to buy reprints of Dick and Jane, do so, but don't read them to your kid. They don't work for that.)

And, really, they're funny for grown-ups too. Don't tell my nieces, but I buy these books for ME, even if I store them on THEIR bookcase!

So, this particular book, I am Going!. Everybody reading the title knows that Piggie is not really going away for good. Gerald will still have somebody to skip and play pingpong in a funny hat with. But Gerald reacts in an incredibly melodramatic fashion (we all saw THAT coming too) until he finds out: Piggie is GOING to have LUNCH. (Punchline: They eat together. "Just like yesterday!")

Best part? Has to be Gerald's forlorn pleas that Piggie should go "next month" or "next year", said while holding a Piggie-themed calendar.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A teacher's view, February 3, 2010

By 

Backroads "Scatter-brained book fan" (Cache Valley, Utah) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

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This review is from: I Am Going! (An Elephant and Piggie Book) (Hardcover)

I shall begin this review by telling why I love the Elephant and Piggie books in general: They are the perfect combination of silly storytelling and easy sight words/decodable text. The illustrations are adorable and hilarious in their charming simplicity. And while many people like to think that the only "good" readers among children are those who pop from the womb reading Tolstoy, the fact remains that kids need easy text upon which to build their skills.

And oh, does Mo Willems win with these books. Beginning readers are given more than meaningless, plotless text; they get the adventures of best friend duo Elephant and Piggie! The stories are simple and quick, but thoroughly entertaining (I once read I Will Surprise My Friend! (An Elephant and Piggie Book) to a group with ages ranging from 14 to 30 and they are all enchanted.) The illustrations take on a major load of the story-telling, making a mere picture walk enough to help figure out the story, leaving more mental power to the actual reading process. Even more advanced readers can use these books for practicing expression (I'm sorry, but anyone reads aloud these books without some degree of screamig is reading them wrong).

Now, onto this particular book. Elephant and Piggie are enjoying a nice day when, out of the blue, Piggie announces she is going. Poor Elephant is devastated, and shows it through his typical drama and over-reacting. It's hilarious and kids will love it. This wasn't quite my favorite of the bunch, but then again I don't think any of these can be truly terrible. Heck, it brought a smile to my face and my studenrs were charmed. The surprise ending and aftermath is certainly worth a laugh. It is presently the in-demand book for personal reading time, and I will go ahead and let them be the judge of its entertainment value.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I am going, February 18, 2010

By 

Fussymonkey (Baltimore, MD) - See all my reviews

This review is from: I Am Going! (An Elephant and Piggie Book) (Hardcover)

I love the Elephant and Piggy books. The simple art style conveys all the emotions with minimal details. I love how it is an easy read and no contractions in the sentences. Repeated word patterns are great for early readers.

Over the series of books Gerald has been more emotionally attached to Piggy.

In this book, Piggy announces that she is going. Gerald begs her to stay. Who will he play with if she's gone? But she sticks to her statement that she is leaving, completely unmoved by his cries. He even fakes his own departure. She tells him "Have fun."
The best part was when he yell at her "why?"

It was like reading every break up movie ever made.

Poor guy never saw it coming.

I won't ruin the twist ending, but it was perfect Mo Willems humor.

I liked this one as much as "I will Surprise my Friend" and "Pigs Make Me Sneeze"

Thank you Mo for making books that are funny for adults as well as children.