cover image The Robin Family

The Robin Family

Rene Robinette. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH), $10.95 (44pp) ISBN 978-0-395-49214-7

The Robin family is nuts. Mrs. Robin's tongue sticks out and she can't get it back in her mouth until she lubricates it with jelly. Mr. Robin has ``a runny nose on both sides,'' but successfully blocks the flow with a bandage. Daughter Chelsea hangs upside down on the couch, hoping to straighten her messy hair. Baby Taylor's tooth is too big for her mouth, but jelly takes care of that problem, too. This is only the first of the Robins' adventures. In the next story, Taylor turns into a gorilla; in the third, Mrs. Robin makes a truly awful beef dish for dinner; in the last, Chelsea is worried that her hands (and then her nose) have outgrown her. It takes a certain sense of humor to go along with the antics in this book--readers should be willing to follow absurd lines of logic. Most children qualify. They'll also love the zippy, wacked-out cartoons and, further, will demand another visit with this crazed but loving bunch. Ages 4-8. (Apr.)