THE RUBBER-LEGGED DUCKY

Thanks to his mother’s accidental ingestion of a rubber band, the duckling dubbed “Five” hatches out with one stretchable leg and a “Bing-boing” rather than a “Quack.” The other farm animals make fun of him, but Mama assures him that “you are different from the others, but you are my special ducky, and that means you can do special, wonderful things.” Indeed, when a fox comes along one night, Five proves his mettle by sounding the alarm and helping to drive the predator off. The plot is a bit thin, but it’s impossible not to like such a clever, heroic ducky, and in Cole’s pleasant rural scenes Five—sporting a squiggly leg that makes the “disability” theme even more explicit than Mama’s comment—is joined by expressive, cleanly drawn sibs and other livestock. All in all, this is closer in spirit and audience appeal to Jane Simmons’s Daisy tales than the classic “Ugly Duckling.” (Picture book. 5-7)