SPAGHETTI

A young mouse who avidly collects found objects is forced to use them (constructively) or lose them.

Spaghetti “sees beauty and possibility in what others no longer need or want.” Two pencil stubs make a terrific pair of stilts, an uncooked strand of spaghetti supports an attractive Alexander Calder–like mobile made up of odds and ends, and so on. Unfortunately, Spaghetti’s large family doesn’t “see the beauty and possibility that Spaghetti sees”; his parents and siblings just want him to clear up the clutter that has overwhelmed their nest. Spaghetti has an idea: Maybe what he sees as “mouse treasure” can be used to “build something beautiful…for everyone in the mouse house!” Spaghetti throws himself into his construction project (“He gathers and sorts. He nibbles and gnaws”) and single-handedly creates a mouse-scale park with button swings, a teeter-totter with Q-tip seats, and more. Brown’s paean to creativity comes with a built-in game of “I spy”: Her delicate digitally assembled mixed-media art features a banquet of repurposed everyday objects that readers can enjoy trying to identify, like the toilet paper–tube base for a nifty mask and the egg carton sorting station that Spaghetti uses while preparing to build. It’s all in good fun—and good conscience, although, while the eco-message is present, it’s no louder than a squeak.

An entertaining case for industriousness and an understated case for upcycling.