Amazon.com
How could such a sweet little red-haired girl's mother accuse her of being wild? Worse still, how could she possibly make her sit in the
time-out chair? That's precisely what this little girl wonders as she sits in the chair and lets her imagination (but not her manners, no way!) run wild: "If I were a lion,/ I'd growl and roar/ and knock the dishes/ on the floor./ I'd scare the hair/ right off the cat,/ but do you see me doing that?" Heather M. Solomon, also the illustrator of
Clever Beatrice, captures the wildness in the little girl's mind in fantastic watercolor and gouache paintings. In the "growl and roar" spread, a ferocious lion is standing on two legs, open-jawed, in the ultra-artsy kitchen, breaking the dishes as the little girl looks on, wide-eyed and innocent. "Wild has feathers./ Wild has scales./ Wild has whiskers, tusks, and tails," she insists, surrounded by a made-up menagerie of owls, parrots, toucans, Old World chameleons, horned toads, snakes, walruses, seals, and fish in a bucket. We all know she protests too much: the title page reveals exhibit A--a childlike lion picture scrawled on the wall and a knocked-over cereal box. (Preschool to age 6)
--Karin Snelson
From School Library Journal
PreSchool-Grade 1-When a young girl is sent to a time-out chair, she defends herself by asking, "Wild?/Who me?" With wide-eyed innocence, she proclaims: "Wild has feathers./Wild has scales./Wild has whiskers, tusks, and tails./Wild is furry./Wild is strong./Wild does not know/right from wrong." As she describes each characteristic, unruly animals take over the kitchen and living room-snorting, charging, and growling as they break dishes, overturn furniture, and create messes. The narrator seems to be surprised by their antics, but the gleam in her eye makes it obvious that she's not as innocent as she appears. So who created the havoc-the animals or this "meek and mild" child? Sharp-eyed readers will enjoy spotting the toys being blamed for the disasters; the endpapers, with numerous stuffed animals strewn haphazardly across them, provide another clue. Solomon adds to the humor by giving the youngster oversized features that make her appear cartoonlike, but with a painterly touch just shy of realistic. Splashes of salt resist on each page form a soft patterned background for the carpeting. An interesting combination of gouache brush strokes scattered over watercolor washes captures the texture of fur and feathers. Pair this book with Maurice Sendak's
Where the Wild Things Are (HarperCollins, 1988) for another protagonist whose imagination runs rampant when he's confined, and to create a storytime that will grab the attention of children who have been placed in a time-out.
-Laurie Edwards, West Shore School District, Camp Hill, PA Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
See all Editorial Reviews
(35)
$11.55
(26)
$11.89
(1)
