Fiction

There Is a Bird On Your Head! (Elephant and Piggie)

In There is a Bird on Your Head!, Gerald discovers that there is something worse than a bird on your head- two birds on your head! Can Piggie help her best friend?

The True Story of the Three Little Pigs

"There has obviously been some kind of mistake," writes Alexander T. Wolf from the pig penitentiary where he's doing time for his alleged crimes of 10 years ago. Here is the "real" story of the three little pigs whose houses are huffed and puffed to smithereens... from the wolf's perspective. This poor, much maligned wolf has gotten a bad rap. He just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, with a sneezy cold, innocently trying to borrow a cup of sugar to make his granny a cake. Is it his fault those ham dinners--rather, pigs--build such flimsy homes? Sheesh.

This 10th-anniversary edition of Jon Scieszka's New York Times Best Book of the Year, The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!, includes a special, impassioned letter from prisoner A. Wolf himself and a snappy new jacket by Caldecott Honor artist Lane Smith, whose quirky perspectives still color the illustrations throughout. As with The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales, the collaborators take a classic story and send it through the wisecracker machine, much to the glee of kids young and old. (Ages 4 to 8 or much, much older) --Emilie Coulter

In this best-selling collaboration between author (and performer) Jon Scieszka and illustrator Lane Smith, with music by noted composer Kurt Hoffman, you will hear Alexander T. Wolf tell the story from his point of view. Side one features narration and music, while side two has music alone, so that you can read it out loud by yourself.

What's Wrong, Little Pookie?

POOKIE'S UPSET AND POOKIE'S MOM cannot figure out why. And Pookie isn't helping, either. This familiar scenario is told with Sandra Boynton's signature humor, in both story and art. Caregivers and young children will laugh their way out of their sorrow as Mom and Pookie work things out. Never fear, a happy ending is on the way! Perfect for toddlers having a meltdown, or anyone in a plain old bad
mood, this book will come to the rescue for kids and adults for years to come.

Olivia Forms a Band

Book Description:
Everyone's favorite Caldecott Honor-winning porcine diva is back and with fanfare! There are going to be fireworks tonight, and Olivia can hardly wait to hear the band. But when she finds out that there isn't going to be a band, she can't understand why not. How can there be fireworks without a band?! And so Olivia sets to putting a band together herself... all by herself. Using pots, pans, her brother's toys, and even her father's suspenders, Olivia forms a band spectacular enough to startle any audience. Lavishly brought to life in Ian Falconer's signature style, and introducing an eye-catching shade of blue, here is Olivia doing what Olivia does best--making noise

Exclusive Art from Ian Falconer's Olivia Forms a Band

Why wasn't this picture included in the book? Here's a look inside the creation of a blockbuster picture book. There were 60 images selected for Olivia Forms a Band out of over 70 pieces of art submitted by Olivia creator Ian Falconer. Sixty images may sound like a lot, but many pages are filled with multiple depictions of our porcine heroine. For instance, when you look at the page where Olivia is removing Daddy's suspenders, this page has nine separate drawings. On the other hand, the glorious fireworks scenes are all composed of one piece of art per page. For this particular image of Olivia provided exclusively for Amazon.com customers, Falconer didn't feel like this artwork captured Olivia's true character. However, many people in-house at Simon & Schuster loved the picture and thought it was typical of a 5-year-old playing with her mother's lipstick. While there's a lot to love in this picture, Ian Falconer after all is the man behind Olivia. He knows better than anyone what makes something up to "Olivia standards." Sometimes that is as simple as being able to know which image works best for a particular moment in the book. In this instance Falconer felt the drawings that were used in the final book served the scene better, and with that this one was left on the cutting room floor.

All About Olivia

Teatro Olivia	Olivia... and the Missing Toy	Olivia Saves the Circus	Olivia

Everyone's favorite Caldecott Honor-winning porcine diva is back and with fanfare! There are going to be fireworks tonight, and Olivia can hardly wait to hear the band. But when she finds out that there isn't going to be a band, she can't understand why not. How can there be fireworks without a band?! And so Olivia sets to putting a band together herself...all by herself. Using pots, pans, her brother's toys, and even her father's suspenders, Olivia forms a band spectacular enough to startle any audience. Lavishly brought to life in Ian Falconer's signature style, and introducing an eye-catching shade of blue, here is Olivia doing what Olivia does best -- making noise.

Olivia . . . and the Missing Toy

Olivia, like many young pigs, experiences life very intensely. She is utterly obsessed with having her mother make her a red soccer shirt (even though the team color is green), until, of course, she discovers that her favorite toy, her very best toy, is missing, at which point she becomes utterly obsessed with finding it. She looks under the rug, the sofa, and the cat. She shouts accusingly at both her younger brother Ian and her baby brother William, who responds with an unsatisfactory "Wooshee gaga." That night (a dark and stormy one), she hears a horrible sound emanating from behind a closed door, and, in a dramatic scene illuminated by her flaming candelabra and showcased in a fold-out spread, she sees the family dog Perry chewing her favorite toy to bits. As devastating as this is to a passionate young pig, "even Olivia couldn't stay mad forever." She sews up her dismembered toy and falls asleep that very night cozied up with both it and the toy-wrecking Perry. The New Yorker cartoonist and Caldecott Honor artist Ian Falconer (Olivia, 2001) fills his pages with delightful visual stunts, such as the time-lapse drawings of Olivia waiting and waiting and waiting for her mom to sew her soccer shirt and the exaggeratedly scary shadow the toy-eating dog casts on the wall. Olivia fans will rejoice to see their favorite pig being her usual extreme self. (Ages 4 to 8) --Karin Snelson

The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig

When it comes time for the three little wolves to go out into the world and build themselves a house, their mother warns them to beware the big bad pig. But the little wolves' increasingly sturdy dwellings are no match for the persistent porker, who has more up his sleeve than huffing and puffing. It takes a chance encounter with a flamingo pushing a wheelbarrow full of flowers to provide a surprising and satisfying solution to the little wolves' housing crisis.

Eugene Trivizas's hilarious text and Helen Oxenbury's enchanting watercolors have made this delightfully skewed version of the traditional tale a contemporary classic.

If You Give a Pig a Pancake (If You Give...)

If you give a pig a pancake, she'll want some syrup to go with it. You'll give her some of your favorite maple syrup, and she'll probably get all sticky, so she'll want to take a bath. She'll ask you for some bubbles. When you give her the bubbles...

"If you give a pig a pancake, she'll want some syrup to go with it. You'll give her some of your favorite maple syrup. She'll probably get all sticky, so she'll want to take a bath." You get the idea. Baths lead to bubbles, bubbles lead to rubber ducks, rubber ducks lead to wanting a trip to the farm. If You Give a Pig a Pancake is a delightful exploration of the scenario "if you give an inch, they'll take a mile." But who could refuse the whims of this adorable piglet? Not us, and certainly not the pig's young caretaker. Parents will feel a familiar twinge as they witness the pig's increasingly elaborate demands, and kids will be delighted that the story circles back around to the original pancake. Laura Numeroff and illustrator Felicia Bond--well-loved creators of If You Give a Mouse a Cookie and If You Give a Moose a Muffin--succeed again in concocting a marvelously skewed study of cause and effect that inevitably results in a riotous read-aloud. Your kids will ask for this book again and again, and you won't want to refuse. (Ages 4 to 8) --Karin Snelson

The Three Pigs

Once upon a time three pigs built three houses, out of straw, sticks, and bricks. Along came a wolf, who huffed and puffed... So, you think you know the rest? Think again. With David Wiesner at the helm, it's never safe to assume too much. When the wolf approaches the first house, for example, and blows it in, he somehow manages to blow the pig right out of the story frame. The text continues on schedule--"...and ate the pig up"--but the perplexed expression on the wolf's face as he looks in vain for his ham dinner is priceless. One by one, the pigs exit the fairy tale's border and set off on an adventure of their own. Folding a page of their own story into a paper airplane, the pigs fly off to visit other storybooks, rescuing about-to-be-slain dragons and luring the cat and the fiddle out of their nursery rhyme.

Wiesner, Caldecott Medal recipient for Tuesday, and Caldecott Honor winner for both Sector 7 and Free Fall, prefers not to wait around until pigs fly. He gives them wings (or paper airplanes) and sets them on their way! In his latest flight of fancy, Wiesner uses shifting illustration styles and fonts to startle complacent readers into an imaginary world even as they ponder the conventional structure of story. His trademark crafty humor and skewed perspectives will tickle readers pink (even the nonporcine variety)! (Ages 4 and older) --Emilie Coulter

This picture book begins placidly (and familiarly) enough, with three pigs collecting materials and going off to build houses of straw, sticks, and bricks. But the wolf's huffing and puffing blows the first pig right out of the story . . . and into the realm of pure imagination. The transition signals the start of a freewheeling adventure with characteristic David Wiesner effects—cinematic flow, astonishing shifts of perspective, and sly humor, as well as episodes of flight. Satisfying both as a story and as an exploration of the nature of story, The Three Pigs takes visual narrative to a new level. Dialogue balloons, text excerpts, and a wide variety of illustration styles guide the reader through a dazzling fantasy universe to the surprising and happy ending. Fans of Tuesday's frogs and Sector 7's clouds will be captivated by old friends—the Three Pigs of nursery fame and their companions—in a new guise.

If You Give a Pig a Party (If You Give...)

If you give a pig a party,she's going to ask for someballoons. When you give her the balloons, she'll want to decorate the house. When she's finished, she'll put on her favorite dress. Then she'll call all her friends -- Mouse, Moose, and more.

The little pig from If You Give a Pig a Pancake is back, and this time she wants to throw a great big party! Laura Numeroff and Felicia Bond have created another winning story for this beloved character in the tradition of the best-selling If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.

Olivia Counts (Olivia)

Learning to count to 10 is no chore when accompanied by Olivia, piglet superstar of Ian Falconer's Caldecott Honor Book, Olivia, and Olivia Saves the Circus. Preschoolers will giggle to see reminders of Olivia's mischief in this simple counting book: "one ball, two bows, three pots of paint"... on up to "ten Olivias," pictured in various familiar poses: trying on pantyhose, standing on her head, earnestly jumping rope, sunbathing, etc. Each sturdy page of this small, square board book provides a backdrop of white on which our black and white porcine heroine struts, with occasional red accessories. Early learners will also enjoy Olivia's Opposites. (Baby to preschool) --Emilie Coulter

In this enchanting board book, toddlers will join everyone's favorite piglet as they learn to count from one to ten.