cover image Mama Hen and Her Baby Chicks 1, 2, 3

Mama Hen and Her Baby Chicks 1, 2, 3

Alison Morris, Beck Ward. Little Simon, $14.95 (10pp) ISBN 978-0-689-85660-0

It's a toy, it's a book, it's Mama Hen and Her Baby Chicks, 1,2,3 by Beck Ward, illus. by Sami Sweeton, featuring four stories in one. Shaped like a chicken, the main die-cut board book concerns a mother's patient wait for her chicks to hatch; the remaining three (Little Chick; Bedtime on the Farm; and What's Inside? Surprise!) are egg-shaped and ingeniously embedded within the larger book. A pull of the hen's tail makes her cluck (via sound chip) and releases the books, like a chicken laying eggs.