Twosomes

December 13, 2010
In this greeting card–sized book, animals express their fondness for one another in rhyming couplets. Two bucktoothed horses exchange gazes in side-by-side stables: "Nose to nose, hip to hip,/ ours is a stable relationship." In another, chameleons peer fondly from respective branches ("You and I could be a team,/ if we agree on color scheme"), and a dolphin gushes, "Come leap with me and be my wife./ You're the porpoise of my life." Singer's endearing puns and Wildish's expressively love-struck cartoon animals should tickle young and old valentines alike. Ages 8–12.

December 15, 2010

This is a gift book, a little Peter Rabbit–sized treat you would give your valentine along with an appropriately diminutive box of sweets. A bijou offering, then, but a well-made one in both its breezy couplets and natty, mildly wacky artwork. The 15 couplets that make up this collection range about, some plainly jokey ("Hugging you takes some practice. / So I'll start out with a cactus," says the porcupine), some touch upon transience ("I'm finding a leaf. You're taking a bite. / Wait a few weeks and our hearts will take flight"). One tackles the urban cool of pigeons: "We'll spend the day wooing, dodging the cars. / We'll spend the night cooing, under the stars." Others play with puns ("You're the porpoise of my life") or brush lightly with love. Wildish's illustrations are chummy and frankly innocent—even the love-zonked squirrel appears to have only been sampling the acorns—and bonbon-sweet without being saccharine. The line work is delicate and exacting, and the colors look as fresh as if they'd just been scraped from the palette. (Picture book/poetry. 6 & up)

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April 1, 2011

Gr 1-4-Each of the 15 poems in this sweet little book is just two lines long. A typical example is "Porcupines": "Hugging you takes some practice./So I'll start out with a cactus." The color picture shows a wide-eyed creature with his arms around a tall and thorny cactus. The humor is sometimes quiet, sometimes silly, and often stems from puns. The smooth writing is simple (in a good sense) and accessible. The color cartoon illustrations, while not distinctive, are engaging nevertheless. Larger collections may want to add this title for next year's Valentine's Day display.-Lauralyn Persson, Wilmette Public Library, IL

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