TIPPY-TIPPY-TIPPY, HIDE!
by Candace Fleming & illustrated by G. Brian Karas
The pesky bunny trio from Fleming and Karas’s Muncha! Muncha! Muncha! (2002) is back, this time bent on sheltering from winter in Mr. McGreely’s cozy abode. Four times the bunnies slip inside, with the exasperated homeowner boarding and bricking up all the entry points. Children will laugh at the patterned wordplay (“Tippy-tippy-tippy, wiggle. / Through the mail slot. / Tippy-jiggle”) and souvenir bunny deposits that so infuriate McGreely as his stuff disappears: tail fluff, nose smudges and the inevitable “bunny drops.” As spring blossoms scent the air, the bunnies loll outdoors in a nest feathered with an assortment of items pinched from the literally shut-in Mr. M. They make a conciliatory offering—a few flowers plucked from the moody gent’s own garden—but he, perhaps foreseeing the looming battle for this year’s carrots, is far from mollified. In Karas’s mixed-media pictures, the flat slate blues and browns of winter yield to touches of spring green and pink. This pleasant follow-up will rightfully charm many readers, but it lacks the unique verve of its rollicking predecessor. (Picture book. 3-7)