Unflappable! Splat the Cat: Where's the Easter Bunny? by Rob Scotton

SPLAT CAN'T BELIEVE IT.

IT IS ALMOST EASTER AND HE STILL HASN'T TOLD THE EASTER BUNNY WHAT HE WANTS MOST!

Splat is back in another holiday adventure. This time he sets forth to find the Easter Bunny and make sure that he knows to bring him an extra large Easter egg.

Never mind that the day before Easter is E.B.'s busiest day of the year. Splat is an exuberant first-grader, and he's just sure he can uncover that undercover Bunny in time.

WHERE IS THE EASTER BUNNY? DO YOU KNOW?

Splat starts at home, looking behind his car. No Easter Bunny. He looks in his backyard shed. No Easter Bunny, just a lot of very strange-looking ducks! Hmmm!

The search continues through the town, with Splat repeating his question everywhere he goes--behind doors, behind the open front section of the town newspaper, THE SGRATGHING POST, with its headline EASTER BUNNY MISSING! where he disturbs a perturbed citizen reading, behind a sign proclaiming "Easter Parade Tomorrow" being put up by his teacher Mrs. Whimpydimple, behind umbrellas held by his buddies Spike and Kitten, and even in his own mailbox.

Nope. Just a package addressed cheerily to Splat the Cat.

There's a sturdy flap to be opened for each place Splat searches, and behind it a familiar character in this best-selling series, while in the background, of course, Splat overlooks the subject of his search, the Easter Bunny, partly visible on almost every page--his ears sticking up from the bathtub beside which Splat's sister has just donned her pink robe, in the store window displays he passes downtown, with his back turned in a phone booth, and just skedaddling over the hill ahead of Splat, leaving telltale colored eggs in his wake.

Kids will probably spot the evidence of the Easter Bunny way before grownups do in Rob Scotton's latest Splat the Cat: Where's the Easter Bunny? (Schwartz & Wade, 2011). Splat is an irresistible character, his fur bristling with energy and his jittery tail always a-wave, filled with the curiosity he shares with his young readers.

Scotton, author of the popular Russell the Sheep books, has a winner here. His series of lift-the-flap paperbacks for the preschool set are a welcome addition to the hardback Splat the Cat series, featuring sturdy flaps with jolly surprises hidden beneath and a repetitive text which youngsters can easily memorize, making this one an "I can read it all by myself" book even for the youngest non-readers, one with lots of visual humor, and an ending which ties the whole book together in a most satisfying way--in an Easter basket with a jaunty bow, some strange-looking ducks--and an EXTRA BIG Easter egg for Splat.