The Kitchen Talks [Hardcover]

Shirley Mozelle (Author), Petra Mathers (Illustrator)

Book Description

Age Level: 4 and up

Ever wonder what your kitchen does in the early hours of the morning?

"I am very very busy, and that is how I like it."

That's what your kitchen would tell you if you listened. While the fridge stays cool as a cucumber, the pot holder is longing for a cool drink. The cookie jar feels sad when its belly is empty. Does the freezer get goose bumps? And do you know what the silverware does in the early hours of the morning?

The next time you're in the kitchen, listen very closely and you'll hear . . .

Petra Mathers, best known for her beloved Lottie's World series, lends her distinctive, quirky style to this humorous collection of poems.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Kindergarten-Grade 5-Mathers's cover illustration tells the overarching story: in a charmed kitchen a smiling doorknob is confronted by 12 microphones determined to get the inside story. Mozelle's verse, mostly bite-sized morsels, offers a playful take on commonplace objects such as paper towels, dishes, the stove, and the kitchen clock. Many of the poems are formulaic riddles that give away their subject in the title line. A few succeed in offering an unusual description of the object, as in Toaster: Jack-in-the-box/For bread/Includes a tan. The terse two-liner for Freezer works in much the same riddlelike way: Cold as ice/But no goose bumps. The 20 short verses offer children amusement and new ways of thinking about things. Whimsical watercolors often appear helter-skelter in their placement from page to page with much white space. Yet there are charming moments such as the painting of the inside of a freezer where a frozen blue trout stands on its tail while juggling a few frozen peas.-Teresa Pfeifer, Alfred Zanetti Montessori Magnet School, Springfield, MA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

PreS-Gr. 2. From the "Chop-chop, / Slice, / Dice" of the cutting board to the swing of the refrigerator door ("Opens / Closes / Opens / Closes--") and the "hummm rummm" of the can opener, these simple, very short poems capture the common sounds and movements of everyday kitchen stuff; and Mathers' lovely watercolors extend the words with wry scenarios that include the clock and the smiling door handle vying for attention. One of the best poems is "Toaster" ("Jack-in-the-box / for bread / Includes a tan"). Then there is the pun about the paper towel ("Don't stop me now--I'm on a roll"). Neither difficult nor distant, the poems here, which will be wonderful for reading aloud, will make kids smile and look again at ordinary things. Hazel Rochman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 4 and up
  
• Hardcover: 40 pages
• Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. (BYR); 1st edition (March 21, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805071431
• ISBN-13: 978-0805071436
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 6.2 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,822,659 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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