World Rat Day: Poems About Real Holidays You've Never Heard Of [Hardcover]

J. Patrick Lewis (Author), Anna Raff (Illustrator)

Book Description

Release date: March 12, 2013 | Age Range: 5 - 8 years

From the Children’s Poet Laureate comes a year-round ode to wacky holidays just begging to be celebrated.

Nobody should ever forget Ewe on Ohio Sheep Day (July 14). No mata mata how hard they may try on World Turtle Day (May 23). If you’ve never heard of Dragon Appreciation Day, International Cephalopod Awareness Day, or Yell "Fudge!" at the Cobras in North America Day, it’s not because they don’t exist, it’s simply that they needed someone to spread the word. Luckily, the fantastically zany poems of J. Patrick Lewis and Anna Raff’s equally hilarious illustrations have memorialized these holidays forever. So get out your calendars — from Happy Mew Year for Cats Day to Chocolate-Covered Anything Day, World Rat Day (April 4) calls for a year-round celebration.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

J. Patrick Lewis has written more than seventy books for children and is the current Children’s Poet Laureate. He lives in Ohio, where, between author visits at schools, he weeps copious tears that his grandchildren live so far away.

Anna Raff is an award-winning illustrator based in New York City where there are reportedly four rats per human resident. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and American Illustration, among others. World Rat Day is her first book with Candlewick Press.

Product Details

• Age Range: 5 - 8 years
  
• Hardcover: 40 pages
• Publisher: Candlewick (March 12, 2013)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0763654027
• ISBN-13: 978-0763654023
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 0.4 x 11 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #354,964 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars MUST READ!! April 20, 2013

By This Kid Reviews Books

Amazon Verified Purchase

Taken from the inside jacket -

"No one will ever forget Ewe" on Ohio Sheep Day (July 14). No mata mata how hard we try on World Turtle Day (May 23).

These two holidays are just a taste of the wild and wacky - and real - holidays you should be celebrating."

Why I liked this book - When I first heard about this book, I thought I would really love it... And I DID!!! This was an awesome book! The poems are top-notch, and the illustrations are awesome too! I love everything about it especially that the wacky poems are based on REAL holidays! This is a great way to celebrate National Poetry Month! J. Patrick Lewis is an AWESOME poet! And the fact that he's Poet Laureate is even better! I also like that the rats show up on all the pages in the book no matter what the holiday is. I think all kids and adults will LOVE this book!

5.0 out of 5 stars A Celebration of Poetry for Children AND their Families April 11, 2013

By David Crumm TOP 1000 REVIEWER

Children's books like M. Patrick Lewis's new World Rat Day clearly are for adults as much as for kids. Lewis already is inside countless homes, coast to coast, inviting children and their parents to read aloud from books like last year's wonderful National Geographic Book of Animal Poetry: 200 Poems with Photographs That Squeak, Soar, and Roar! That big, fun, colorful volume won all kinds of honors, including nearly unanimous 5-star praise on Amazon in reader reviews.

If you don't have that particular book on your shelf, then perhaps you've got one of Lewis's other 80-plus books! Lewis's various titles have been released by more than a dozen major publishing houses. In 2011, the Poetry Foundation named Lewis its third U.S. Children's Poet Laureate. In other words: You're placing yourself in masterful hands when you buy, enjoy--or give away one of his books.

This year, Lewis is back with a fanciful volume that grabs hold of the calendar -- specifically the holidays that chart our progress through the year -- and encourages his readers to think fancifully about the way we mark time. He calls it: World Rat Day: Poems About Real Holidays You've Never Heard Of.

Given his career-long fascination with the natural world, most of the holidays he marks with playful poems and colorful illustrations by Anna Raff have to do with living creatures. His style of poetry toys with words, with the shape of his lines on the page -- providing lots of fun for young readers and their parents. Envision a cross between Lewis Caroll, ee cummings and Ogden Nash.

Lewis claims that all of the holidays in his new book are real, although you'll have to look far and wide to find the groups that "officially declared" some of these holidays. And, no, this book does not include a page of web links or other information about these festivals that he and Raff celebrate. But that's hardly the point.

The real point is seeing our planet in a new way--and remembering the living creatures that make it such a marvelous place in which to live.

Lewis's shortest poem is just six words in a single line for the mid-summer Ohio Sheep Day: "No one will ever forget Ewe."

And, if you welcome this book into your home, your children will never forget your gift.