DAVY CROCKETT SAVES THE WORLD

Vowing that “every single word is true, unless it is false,” Schanzer (Escaping to America, 2000, etc.) relates an American hero’s greatest feat. Called from the backwoods to save the world, Davy takes on Halley’s comet itself, battling the onrushing juggernaut over land and sea, and sending it hurtling back the way it came, tail (figuratively) between its legs. Using one-fourth of each two-paged spread for text, Schanzer fills the rest with softly colored figures who turn robust as the battle begins. Depicted as a clean-shaven, strong-jawed, Rambo-esque figure in form-fitting buckskins, Davy cuts a truly admirable figure; likewise, the Earthbound comet, with its glaring red eyes and sharklike teeth, makes a suitably ferocious-looking adversary. Stopping short of caricature, these folksy critters suit the aw-shucks language perfectly in this original tale. Davy does such a fine job that he wins a seat in Congress, plus the hand of apple-cheeked Sally Sugartree—whose own dustups get an equally vigorous recap in Steven Kellogg’s Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett (1995), a natural companion piece. (author’s note) (Tall tale/picture book. 7-9)