WHAT’S THE TIME, GRANDMA WOLF?

Suspense looms in the air as young woodland creatures get closer and closer to big bad Grandma Wolf until it looks like their collective gooses may be cooked. Word spreads in the forest (a very lovely and lush forest as portrayed in Brown’s watercolors) that a bad old hairy wolf is living nearby. A company of animals puts aside their trepidation and goes to investigate. From outside the wolf’s house, they can see her asleep in her bed. Piglet calls out, “What’s the time, Grandma Wolf?” She replies that it’s time to get up. Each creature in turn asks the time, and each time they take a step closer to the wolf, as she scrubs the cooking pot, fetches water, sets it to boil, until finally they are very close and Grandma Wolf cries out, “Dinnertime!” The animals stand frozen, like fawns caught in the beam of a headlight, but Grandma’s only ready to serve them a vegetable stew and read them a story—guess which one. Young readers will feel a note of pleasing apprehension—mostly from Grandma’s rack of conspicuous fangs—but never enough to stir terror. The repetitions may even provoke readers to chime in, and Brown (The Scarecrow’s Hat, p. 179, etc.) has provided the rules for a game—“What’s the Time, Mr. Wolf?”—that kids can play on their own. (Picture book. 2-5)