The language isn’t quite as basic, though, and as it rendered entirely in dialogue-Mother Pig’s lines are italicized-adult readers will have to work hard at their vocal characterizations for it to make any sense. Chunky figures surrounded by lots of bright white space in Segal’s minimally detailed watercolors keep the visuals as simple as the plotline. It’s hard to poop and pee in zero gravity too!” And so on, until Mom’s enticing promise of treasure in the deep sea persuades her little Treasure Hunter to take a dive.

I’m an astronaut, okay?” “ Well, it is hard to bathe in zero gravity. Using a strategy that would probably be a nonstarter in real life, the mother deflects her stubborn offspring’s string of bath-free occupational conceits with appeals to reason: “Pirates NEVER EVER take baths!” “ Pirates don’t get seasick either. 4-6)Įchoes of Runaway Bunny color this exchange between a bath-averse piglet and his patient mother. Parents too will find this droll switcheroo a hoot and a half. Even very young children will respond to the outsized outrage that Little Hoot expresses in every simply drawn line and-when the long hour is up at last-the joyous release with which he bounds into bed without even waiting for a bedtime story. Corace puts her big-headed birds in human dress and surrounds them, along with the occasional leaf-decorated bed or chair, with plenty of white space. “When I grow up, I’m going to let my kids go to bed as early as they want,” grumbles Little Hoot, slouching off for another hour’s fort-building, skateboarding and bed-jumping. “Stay up and play for one more hour and then you can go to sleep,” says Mama Owl. All of his friends go to bed early, so why can’t he? “Rules of the roost,” says Papa Owl. Little Hoot likes school, and doesn’t mind practicing pondering and staring like a good owl-but hates, hates, hates having to stay up late. Another captivating, crowd-pleasing twist on a familiar domestic issue from the creators of Little Pea (2005).

Little hoot book