Know Thyself! I'm a Hare, So There! by Julia Rowan-Zoch

"HELLO, RABBIT!"

A small rodent with a furry tail cheerfully hails a passing creature from his sentry post on top of a saguaro cactus. But the passerby seems a bit picky about his choice of nomenclature.

"RABBIT? DID YOU SAY RABBIT?"

"I'M NO FLOPSY, MOPSY, OR COTTONTAIL! I'M A HARE! H-A-R-E, CHIPMUNK!"

"I'M A HARE, SO THERE!"

/p>

Hmmm. Two can play at that pedantic game, the little rodent thinks.

blockquote>"TECHNICALLY, I'M A GROUND SQUIRREL," HE POINTS OUT. "BUT YOU ARE A JACKRABBIT."

Jack launches into a lecture on how hares are different from rabbits. They have bigger ears and feet. Newborn rabbits have no fur, whereas hares have a full coat and are born with their eyes wide open and ready to go. They can jump way higher and further than those pipsqueeky bunnies. Jack continues his exposition with a discourse on differences between tortoises and turtles, sheep and goats, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH!

Chippie (a.k.a Ground Squirrel) interrupts the disquisition, leaping to Hare's head as a shaggy, howling interloper leaps from behind a rock. Dog? Wolf? Coyote? Who cares?

"GOTCHA, RABBIT!"

It's time for Hare's hind legs to do the stuff that their species is famous for and start leaping, in author Julie Rowan-Zoch's latest, I'm a Hare, So There! (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021), a cleverly paced hare tale with dowright hilarious illustrations and a lot of incidental information about the speciational differences of animals of the Sonorran desert. The Bulletin for the Center for Children's Books calls this one "A sneakily educational readaloud."

This most recent picture book makes a good partner with Cece Bell's top-selling I Yam a Donkey! (A Yam and Donkey Book) I Yam a Donkey! (A Yam and Donkey Book) and You Loves Ewe! (A Yam and Donkey Book). (See reviews here.)