LITTLE PENGUIN'S TALE

by Audrey Wood ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 1989

The irrepressible author of Elbert's Bad Word and King Bidgood's in the Bathtub for the first time illustrates her own book in full color--successfully bringing out the humor of her ebullient text while creating unusually lively, interesting illustrations. As Grand Nanny Penguin tells her six little charges about the adventures of a little, long-ago penguin, who ""snuck off to have some fun,"" a seventh penguin is seen similarly making tracks for the great unknown. The penguin in Nanny's story has several close shaves and some wild adventures, chief among them going off in a rickety boat with a bunch of gooney birds who take him to the Walrus Polar Club--a cross between a circus and a nightclub. Then he gets eaten by a whale--but that doesn't suit Nanny's audience, so she provides an alternative happy ending, just as the seventh present-day penguin comes running back to join his mates. Nanny with her pince-nez and the little ones--each with a basket of fruit that they consume as the book progresses--are comically expressive, while Wood's nicely painted sky, sea, and the icy hills (where tracks betray the wayward penguin's true activities) make a dramatic setting. Rollicking good fun--in a book that well rewards rereading.

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1989

ISBN: 0152474765

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1989

Categories: CHILDREN'S