THE ARTSY SMARTSY CLUB

After a nearly 30-year drought, the sequels to The Hoboken Chicken Emergency are coming fast and furious. Following up on Looking for Bobowicz (2004), friends Loretta Fischetti, Bruno Ugg and Ivan “call me Nick” Itch, along with the six-foot-tall chicken Henrietta, are back. With zany librarian Starr Lackawanna kayaking off Baffin Island and Radio Jolly Roger on hiatus, things are looking pretty dull in Hoboken—until the kids find some magnificent art on the pavement down by the docks and take up with Lucy Casserole, the legendary screever (that’s a sidewalk chalk artist, to those in the know). Under Lucy’s expert tutelage, Loretta, Bruno and Nick develop their abilities both to appreciate and to create art. A host of trademark Pinkwater loonies dominate the foreground of this work, but a genuine and enthusiastic affection for the fine arts forms the background. Loretta, Bruno and Nick can hardly be called realistically childlike characters, but the author renders their responses to art so wholeheartedly and passionately, and with such respect for the capacities of children, that the result is a sweetly cock-eyed ode to composition, color and form. (Fiction. 8-12)