The Diggers Are Coming!

Continuing in the vehicular theme of her previous books, including Red Car Red Bus and Rattle and Rap, Steggall celebrates the transformation of a dilapidated plot of land into a thriving community. Wreckers are first on the scene: “they whack and they wallop and wham! Flinging and slinging their weight around, they bash old buildings to the ground.” Steggall doesn’t neglect the manpower behind the horsepower, though. Planners “with laptops and levels and lists” are next to arrive, and her detailed paper-collage scenes are busy with activity as a mostly male workforce in plaid jackets, orange vests, baseball caps, and hardhats drives trucks onto the work site, spreads concrete, lays bricks, and paves roads. Her textured papers are equally adept at portraying the manmade (vehicles big and small, tidy newly constructed homes) and the natural (stones, mud, foliage), and the narrative’s ongoing riffs on the exclamation of the title (“Bulldozers are coming! Bulldozers are coming, with bold and brilliant blades”) create an infectious sense of excitement about the unfolding demolition and construction. Ages 4–8. (Sept.)