What's Your Favorite Bug?

PreS-Gr 2--In this companion to What's Your Favorite Animal? and What's Your Favorite Color?, 14 children's book illustrators join Carle in revealing their favorite insects. Using different media and artistic styles, along with poems, anecdotes, or brief information about the merits of their creature, each contributor presents his or her choice on a spread. The insects are striking, and most appear stretched across the pages. Carle, who humorously depicts himself with a caterpillar head complete with antennae and huge eyes above his bushy white beard, begins. He loves caterpillars because The Very Hungry Caterpillar has made fans the world over. Six adorable bees dance and sway atop huge flowers as Molly Idle describes the "boogie-woogie wiggle" and "buzzing ballet" they use to lead their companions to the best blossoms. A worker bee, Eric Fan's favorite, stands upright carrying a briefcase and sporting a bowler. Three incredibly patterned peacock spiders crawl across Brendan Wenzel's pages. Back matter provides brief biographies accompanied by childhood photos for all the illustrators: Denise Fleming, Teagan White, Beth Krommes, Scott Magoon, Ekua Holmes, Tim Hopgood, Kenard Pak, Britta Teckentrup, Eugene Yelchin, and Joey Chou. VERDICT Eye-catching larger-than-life illustrations and interesting information that might spark further investigation into the insect world make this an excellent choice for all libraries.--Marianne Saccardi, Children's Literature Consultant, Cambridge, MA