Billy and Milly, Short and Silly!
By Eve Feldman, Illustrated by Tuesday Mourning
Putnam Juvenile, 2009
Pages: 32
Suggested Ages: 3-7
ISBN-13: 0399246517
Fourteen two- and three-page short stories amaze and amuse in this easier-than-easy reader. In fact, each story is no longer than four rhyming words. How can you tell a story in three or four words? With pictures. "Stoops," it says on one page. Two children-a boy with a basketball and a girl with her arms crossed-are sitting on two city stoops, and there's an ice cream truck approaching in the street. On the next page, it says "Hoops," and the boy, who has just tossed the ball into the basket, stands with his arm upraised. "Scoops" is the other word on the page. The girl is eating a double-decker ice cream cone, unaware the basketball is about to bonk her, maybe on the head. Kids can probably predict what is going to happen on the next page, not to mention come up with the fourth rhyming word-Oops-as the ball lands on top of her cone. Lively mixed media collage illustrations in fine black line, flat colors, and wallpaper-like patterns, showcase the two kids and their mini adventures.
THEMES: EASY READERS. FRIENDSHIP. HUMOR. STORIES IN RHYME.
Fourteen two- and three-page short stories amaze and amuse in this easier-than-easy reader. In fact, each story is no longer than four rhyming words. How can you tell a story in three or four words? With pictures. "Stoops," it says on one page. Two children-a boy with a basketball and a girl with her arms crossed-are sitting on two city stoops, and there's an ice cream truck approaching in the street. On the next page, it says "Hoops," and the boy, who has just tossed the ball into the basket, stands with his arm upraised. "Scoops" is the other word on the page. The girl is eating a double-decker ice cream cone, unaware the basketball is about to bonk her, maybe on the head. Kids can probably predict what is going to happen on the next page, not to mention come up with the fourth rhyming word-Oops-as the ball lands on top of her cone. Lively mixed media collage illustrations in fine black line, flat colors, and wallpaper-like patterns, showcase the two kids and their mini adventures.
Speech teachers will especially love this book, as it inspires children to retell and flesh out each story using words. Read one or more of the stories to your kids without showing them the pictures. Have them draw their own panels of pictures to show what they think will happen with a set of words like: Room, Broom, Zooooom, and Boom. Or Shop, Drop, Mop, and Flop. They can try their hands at coming up with sets of three or four new rhyming words and turning them into stories, drawing an accompanying sequence of pictures to explain the action.
THEMES: EASY READERS. FRIENDSHIP. HUMOR. STORIES IN RHYME.
- Both clever and slapstick, this book can be read for pleasure or used as a jumping-off point for thinking about rhyme, language, and story.
- School Library Journal
