In Roche's coping-with-a-bully tale, vulnerable Mim and menacing June resolve their conflict in gym class. Mim doesn't mind being little. "For Mim, the absolute best thing about being small was that she always got to be first in her second grade line." But when the second and third grade classes combine for gym, Mim ends up displacing June, who towers over her fellow third-graders ("Move it, shorty!... I'm
always first," June tells Mim). Not just miffed, June becomes a monster; in one unsettling closeup, Roche renders June's face with an ugly, mask-like fury. She threatens Mim ("I'll get you"), stalks her in the bathroom and stomps on a cupcake Mim gives her as a peace offering (based on Mim's mother's suggestion that "Maybe you can do something to be friends"). Although Roche portrays the characters as cats, the bluntness of her renderings and characterizations gives these vignettes an uneasy verisimilitude. Without the sly humor that made her Little Pig Is Capable
crackle, and a facile ending (Mim and June reconcile when they're thrown together as partners in the Gym Olympics), the story may come across as didactic and unhelpful to those who may find themselves in Mim's shoes. Ages 4-8. (Mar.)
