Counting Curmudgeon! 1 Grumpy Bruce: A Counting Book by Ryan T. Higgins

Take a pair of interloping skunk house sitters, and a trice of messy partying mice, four greedy goslings, five silly squirrels, and some six trudging turtles, and what do you get?

You might say a grumpy old geezer of a bear--except that Bruce the black bear is always crabbv, so how can you tell what peeves him?

It's doesn't help to add numbers of silly squirrels, peeping birdies, prickly porcupines, and even invading elephants! Hey! Wait! Elephants don't even live in the North Woods!

Nine porcupines, wanting hugs?

Really?

But if there's one thing you can count on to make Mother Goose Bruce even more cantankerous, it's more woodland critters invading his den when he's in the mood to hibernate, and author-illustrator Ryan T. Higgins can be counted on to pull Bruce's chain with increasing numbers of little forest dwellers and one hopelessly out-of-place elephant in his brand-new board book, 1 Grumpy Bruce: A Counting Board Book (Mother Bruce Series) (Disney Hyperion Books, 2018).

Higgin's humorous sight gags make even counting to ten for toddlers ticklebox material, not to mention educational. Certain silliness and good humor make this concept book a good way to introduce Higgins' jolly picture books (see reviews here) to lucky preschoolers, as well as Higgin's Mother Goose Bruce best sellers (reviews here).