WHAT THE LADYBUG HEARD

Ten googly-eyed farm animals (cow, hen, goose, duck and others) all say just the right things (“Moo,” “cluck,” etc.) while the ladybug simply listens. She hears a plot to steal the prize cow outlined by two men who drive up in a big black van, so she devises a cunning one of her own to thwart them. Each of the animals participates in diverting the robbers from their carefully mapped path through the farm and foiling their plans with a little exercise in multilingualism—now the goose says “neigh,” and the cats say “oink.” Monks’s bright, clear and colorful full-page collage-and–line-drawing art delivers a sense of cheerful animation. Low on menace and high on clever silliness, this highly readable rhyming tale will have young listeners participating in the delivery of these unexpected variations on animal sounds and examining the last scene, with the thieves taken away by the constabulary and their footprints left behind to tell the tale of their failed scheme. Read-it-again fun. (Picture book. 2-6)