EAT YOUR PEAS, IVY LOUISE!

A toddler finds better things to do with an approaching spoonful of peas than merely chowing down. As she looks on in delight in the neatly drawn and colored art, they sprout little faces and limbs, proceed to hurtle about her tray table performing circus stunts and tricks, then re-gather into the spoon so that their appreciative audience of one can flip them out the window to freedom. Landry adds a brief, rhythmic text, nearly all of it spoken in an adult-sounding idiom—“Just marvel at those super-snappy, roly-poly acrobats,” a leguminous emcee warbles—and leaves the strangely inattentive (at least, at the end) parents offstage. As pleasant to hold as it is to share, this neatly designed little gem makes a whimsical alternative to Sarah Wilson’s Muskrat, Muskrat, Eat Your Peas! (1989) and like ap-pea-ling fare and a perfectly timed complement to Little Pea (see below). (Picture book. 2-5)