Blue Doggies!: Traffic Pups by Michelle Meadows

RIP AND RUMBLE

DOWN THE STREET.

SILVER BADGES

ON THE BEAT.

An intriguingly large shopping bag with a Toy City logo lies on the floor, with toy cars and trucks spilling from the top. A group of toy animal people on the bed eye the new acquisitions with great interest, while their boy runs out the door, page left. When will they get to ride?

But once the title page is out of the way, the street action begins. Suiting up, the three pups, formerly featured in Meadows' Pilot Pups, don their blue uniforms and pin on their shiny badges, and the pup cops hit those mean streets.

Well, not really that mean! A speeder goose on the loose is spotted, and "ZOOM, VROOM!" the faulty fowl is nabbed and properly ticketed.

Then, with sirens screaming, the pup police are off to service a wreck on the highway. Tow trucks are summoned, and irate motorists get restive as traffic backs up. But never fear! Traffic Pups are here, directing the flow around the mishap with professional aplomb.

Captain Dog keeps the boys on the beat until the shift is over and it's time to pull into their police parking lot at the bottom of the bed and hit the bunkhouse atop the toy chest there.

Michelle Meadows' just published Traffic Pups (Simon & Schuster, 2011) takes a rhythmic and light-hearted look at Toytown law enforcement, assisted ably by artist Dan Andreason, whose rounded motorcycles and pup policeman are as lovable as, well, plush puppies, which, of course, they are. Fun for any toddler storytime and with just a hint of a bedtime tale at the end--a lovely look at traffic control for the youngest readers.