Deciding, for obscure reasons, that it’s time for a bath, a solitary cowboy discovers that being clean can have unexpected complications in this side-splitting double debut. Ordering his dog to guard his clothes, the cowboy bounds into a river with a nearly new bar of lye soap to wash off the reek of black pepper and mesa mud, of wild boar and cow. But the dog doesn’t recognize this fresh-smelling stranger, and defends the duds until a knockdown, drag-out brawl leaves the cowboy covered in mud. Unfortunately, this leaves those clothes, except for hat and boots, in shreds. Realistically modeling setting and figures, but keeping the Legion of Decency off his case in numerous artful ways, Rex puts his cowhand, “naked as a nickel,” up against a decidedly coyote-ish canine, then sends the two plodding back to their shack beneath an ineffectual rain shower. Inspired by an anecdote passed down in the author’s family, this cautionary tale should please all young readers with an aversion to soap and water. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Aug. 8, 2003
ISBN: 0-374-31791-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2003
Gibbons’s 100th book is devoted to presenting swine in a positive light; she quickly demystifies the stereotypes that cast pigs as smelly, dirty, greedy, and dull. Descended and domesticated from the wild boar, pigs come in hundreds of varieties, colors, shapes, and sizes; in simple language, the book outlines their characteristics, breeds, intelligence, communication, habits, and uses. The author distinguishes the various terms—hog, swine, gilt, sow, boar—while also explaining the act of wallowing in mud. The bulk of the text is characteristically factual, but Gibbons allows herself an opinion or two: “They are cute and lovable with their curly tails, their flat pink snouts and their noisy squeals and grunts.” Pen-and-watercolor drawings show sprightly pigs and a plethora of pink-cheeked children in tranquil farm scenes. (Picture book/nonfiction. 4-8)
Pub Date: March 15, 1999
ISBN: 0-8234-1441-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1999
Commissioned to flesh out a storyline and create a spoken text for a New York City Ballet production set to the Saint-Saëns piece, Lithgow offers a tale of a wayward schoolboy who escapes his teacher during a museum visit, falls asleep surrounded by stuffed exhibits in a closed gallery, and dreams of his classmates, neighbors, music teacher, librarian, mother, and great-aunt as animals. The author once again shows his knack for brisk doggerel—“Oliver Pendleton Percy the Third / Was a mischievous imp of a lad. / The tricks that he played on Professor McByrd / Nearly drove the old schoolmaster mad.” Kulikov catches the rollicking comic tone with floridly dressed, theatrically posed figures bearing animal-like heads on humanoid bodies, or vice versa, performing for an amused-looking lad in a rumpled school blazer. An attendant CD features actor Lithgow’s animated reading, interspersed with musical passages from the production. Though not quite another “Peter and the Wolf,” this will give a much-performed orchestral piece a leg up with younger listeners—and it works at least as well on paper as it does on stage. (Picture book with CD. 7-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-689-86721-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2004
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