INTERRUPTING CHICKEN RAISES HER WING

Can the notoriously undisciplined Chicken keep it together in her latest outing?

In her fifth picture-book vehicle, Chicken is off on a class trip to an art museum. Before everyone goes inside, teacher Mr. Popperman, a rooster in statement eyeglasses, reminds his all-barnyard-animals class of the rules: “Be on your best behavior” and (he means Chicken here) “Raise your wing if you want to say something!” Chicken tries her best, but she keeps blowing her chance to answer Mr. Popperman’s questions about various artworks. (Chicken: “I can’t believe you STILL didn’t call on me. I didn’t call out!” Mr. Popperman: “Chicken, you were jumping up and down and moaning!”) Chicken is mad enough to express her feelings via a make-your-own-hieroglyphics activity, writing, “She razed her wing 3 TIMES!...But did Mr. Popermin call on her? NO!” The narrative plays out like a two-character comedy skit, but the hoot of a resolution is somehow also—what’s this?—heartwarming. Stein does right by his frantically funny, visually kinetic series, and he scales new heights with his painterly renditions of several masterworks (Edvard Munch’s The Scream among them), into which Chicken reliably manages to insert herself. While young readers will understand that the story revolves around a classic childhood transgression—speaking out of turn—they will also understand that Stein’s sympathies are with them.

Sorry, Interrupting Cow: This chatty chicken holds on to the title of funniest etiquette-challenged barnyard friend.