Let's Be Animals (Harper Growing Tree) - Hardcover

Ann Turner is the author of many novels, picture books, and poetry collections for children, including Angel Hide and Seek, illustrated by Lois Ehlert, Mississippi Mud, illustrated by Robert J. Blake, Shaker Hearts, illustrated by Wendell Minor, and Through Moon and Stars and Night Skies, a Reading Rainbow selection, illustrated by James Graham Hale. She lives in Williamsburg, MA.

Rick Brown has illustrated many books for children, including Fletcher and the Great Big Dog by Jane Kopper Hilleary, Rock-a-Bye Farm by Diane Johnston Hamm, and Princess and the Potty by Wendy Cheyette Lewison. He lives in Furlong, PA.

PreSchool-K-In this patterned picture book about imaginative play, a group of culturally diverse children visit a farm. One side of each double-page spread shows an animal while the other side shows a child imitating its actions. The line-and-wash illustrations are colorful, but appear quite stiff and static for a book that promotes movement. The simplistic cartoon style, resulting in "look-alike" children, is at odds with the attempt to show ethnic diversity. Forced and awkward rhymes mar the text: "I can be a pig/with a pink and pudgy snout/to dig the acorns out." This book could be used with young children to teach animal sounds or as a springboard to a game of "pretend." However, titles such as Lorinda Bryan Cauley's Clap Your Hands (Putnam, 1992) and Franz Brandenberg's Cock-a-Doodle-Doo (Greenwillow, 1986; o.p.) do the same thing more effectively.
Heide Piehler, Shorewood Public Library, WI
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.