Animal Colors (Christopher Neal's Animals)

Neal takes the evergreen concept of animal mashups and integrates a color lesson. Text and images work in tandem for maximum effect: "When a blue rhino and a green tortoise mix, they made a..." A tortoise in mid-descent looks as surprised as the rhino he's about to land on. The result of their collision is turquoise rhortoise, an animal with a tortoise's shell and a rhino's horn. The animal hybrids get more preposterous, when a yellow kangaroo and a green moose mix, making a chartreuse kangamoose, and when a blue grizzly bear and a purple bee are combined, the result is a violet brizzly. A final animal conglomerate combines all of the animals and colors featured so far, which results in a beast with a yellow trunk, blue wings, and the green legs of an elephant, which Neal doesn't attempt to name. A wildly entertaining spin on color theory. Also available: Animal Shapes. Ages 3-6. (Mar.)