Summer Reading Program 2014. Week 7: Food Science Rejects; Round Four

Final round of rejected Food Science books - I was very close to choosing all of these, and on a different day, or in a slightly different mood, I may have actually used any of them instead.


The Gulps
Rosemary Wells, illustrated by Marc Brown
ISBN: 9780316014601

I really wanted to hate this book when I saw it first, but I just couldn't.  The story is hokey and more than a little heavy-handed, but the family is so good-natured that despite it all, they're easy to root for.  The Gulps are a family of obese rabbits (minus one health-conscious daughter) heading off on their vacation in their oversized mobile home, ready to stop at every fast-food place they can find.  Instead, their RV breaks down in a field, and they are forced to live and work with a farming family (thin and hardworking, of course) for the summer, eating organic foods and pitching in on the farm.  They aren't much use at first, being both fat and unused to physical labor, but over time they toughen up, slim down, and begin to enjoy their newfound energy.  The summer finally over, they fix up the RV and head back onto the road home, stopping at an all-you-can-eat salad buffet to cement their new lifestyle.  It's cute, that's all I can say.  Somehow the heavy-handed message seems more funny and tongue-in-cheek than punitive, and no characters engage bashing either lifestyle or food-choice.  A serious contender, but I felt like I wanted to keep the focus on food itself, not people's relationship with food.  


Eat Like a Bear
April Pulley Sayre, illustrated by Steve Jenkins
ISBN: 9780805090390

I really wanted to make this work, but it was up against stiff competition and just barely didn't make it (apologies for the pun).  So, now I just have to do an animal habitat or animal diet storytime so I can use it then!  We follow a lovely collage-of-textural-materials bear through the year, month by month, through a lovely tripping rhyme sequence that covers the major food that the bear will eat that month; new spring shoots and long-dead animals in early spring through ants and clovers and trout in the summer to roots and groundhogs and moths and honey in fall.  I especially like that the story doesn't shy away from the omnivorous nature of a bear, and spends as much time on the insects as it does on plants and animal food sources.  A spread at the end passes on more factual info, broken into different sub-topics.  Really really lovely and enjoyable.  Can't wait to read it for the kids!


Cook-A-Doodle-Doo!
Janet Stevens and Susan Stevens Crummel, illustrated by Janet Stevens
ISBN: 0152056580

I have loved this book since I first encountered it for storytime a few years ago.  I try to read it at least once a year.  The grandson of the Little Red Hen (you know, the one who couldn't get any help baking?) finds grandma's old recipe book in his coop, and decides to try it out.  The traditional lazybones remain unwilling to assist, but he's got new friends now, and a turtle, iguana, and pot-bellied pig stand ready and (somewhat) able to help out!  His friends are invested and eager helpers, but not so great at cooking.  They misunderstand the directions, fetch the wrong things, and want to continually taste the in-process recipe.  Despite setbacks, and one calamity, the foursome rally and create a beautiful strawberry shortcake.  The illustrations are delicious, the animals are hysterical, and the casual nod to the classic childhood story just make me all sorts of happy inside.  Sidebars on most of the pages pass on short factoids about ingredients or utensils or processes.  As a bonus, after you've drooled over the lovely shortcake, you can use the enclosed recipe to make your own!  Love this book forever!

Tuesday Storytime: Jumpy

Add this one to my roster of "weird themes" - this one is about animals jumping.  It was great fun, if you're wondering, especially Jump! which seems created for wild and active toddlers.


Oops-a-Daisy!
Claire Freedman, illustrated by Gaby Hansen
ISBN: 1589250370
Pastels, soft edges, and a gentle "moral" to keep trying.

This one is very sweet.  Little Bunny is discouraged by her difficulties in learning to jump - it's so hard to get her feet to do what she asks, and there's so much to keep track of all at the same time!  Anyone, even adults learning a new physical skill, can sympathize with the frustration and despair of ever getting it "right."  But Mama Rabbit is always nearby, and she deflects worries and defeatism by pointing out the other "Little" animals learning to do things also; Mouse trying to climb a grass stem, Badger (with Daddy Badger!!) digging, Duck swimming in circles.  Daisy Bunny relaxes and continues to try, knowing that everyone tries and fails.
Good length for my little ones, with full-spread illustrations to keep their attention during the longer patches of reading.



Jump!
Scott M. Fischer
ISBN: 9781416978848
Super-bright cartoonish animals with exaggerated features and almost no text to clutter the page.

I LOVE IT!  Starting with a bug on a jug, the animals encounter something bigger and badder, each time JUMP!ing out of the way, til we get to the shark vs the whale, and we get a vertical spread instead of the normal horizontal flow.



If You're Hoppy
April Pulley Sayre, illustrated by Jackie Urbanovic
ISBN: 9780061566349
A very 'interactive' and non-traditional text, using the "If You're Happy and you Know It" rhyme to riff off of.

This one's cute, especially when it gets to "if you're slimy and scaly and mean, you're a... oh, never mind" with a multicolored shadow of a creepy monster on the page and reveals it at the end to be the frog from the start of the story.  Very fun, and a great ending for the day.  Any book with a surprise reveal pterodactyl is a good book.