From Publishers Weekly
This tall tale's blend of fact and fiction falls flat. Unlike the All About series and Arnosky's other books that focus closely on animal habitats and other factual details, this one spins a yarn based on the author's own real encounter with an enormous moose. While driving home from a fishing trip, "Big Jim" sees an animal roadblock ahead, "nine feet tall from head to hoof." He feels frustrated not to have "a pencil for to draw the white-legged bull" and tracks the moose the next day in order to sketch him. When he suddenly finds himself face-to-face with his quarry, Big Jim bolts up a tree to safety, but loses his art suppliesAso he is again unable to record the sight. Neither character is developed in a way that would keep readers involved. Though the opening illustrations of geese and the eponymous moose show signs of Arnosky's signature attention to detail, succeeding spreads convert the moose to a kind of Bullwinkle caricature. Images of Big Jim clinging to a birch that bends under his weight or of the moose eating leaves within inches of Jim's face border on mawkish. A song (inconveniently split in the middle by the story) makes up the endpapers. Ages 4-up. (May)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
Grade 2-5Arnosky, who has provided young readers with solid information on a vast array of animals, has written a song based on his one-time encounter with a large bull moose. It begins with promise but after the animal forces Big Jim to drop his sketchbook and escape into a tree, the action ends abruptly and unsatisfactorily. The artists sturdy, fluid line and ability to incorporate humor into full-color, naturalistic drawings, as in the Crinkleroot tales (S & S), remains strong, but the verse strains (rhyming cool with bull) and the use of unnatural word order (An expert tracker, Big Jim was./He soon was on the trail) disrupts a smooth read. Music and a note about the songs origins are provided.Barbara Elleman, Marquette University, Milwaukee, WI
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
