Mirror Image! Ollie's Valentine by Olivier Dunrea

OLLIE WANTS A VALENTINE.

Gossie got her valentine from Gertie. But Gossie and Gertie don't have a valentine for Ollie.

Little Ollie's feathers are ruffled. Everyone he meets has a valentine, everyone but him. Gertie has one from BooBoo, BooBoo has one from Peedie, and Peedie has one from Gideon. Nobody has one for Ollie.

Ollie doesn't like the way this day is going.

"WHO WILL BE MY VALENTINE?" HE HONKS.

But in Olivier Dunrea's latest about his little flock of ducklings and goslings in his beloved Gossie and Friends series, Ollie's Valentine (Gossie & Friends) (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015) there is an, um, reflective surprise on the final page which will allow every little reader to be Ollie's Valentine. With its shiny, sparkly valentines and the wistful little gosling on the cover, this bright board book catches the pathos of Ollie's anxiety about being left out on Valentine's Day in Dunrea's signature illustrative style, spot art centered on bright white pages, sturdy and easily manipulated by small fingers and with skillfully designed drawings which almost tell the story on their own.

IT'S HALLOWEEN NIGHT.
A NIGHT TO BEWARE.
GOSLINGS ARE ON THE PROWL.

OLLIE STALKS IN THE CORNFIELD.

The gosling gang goes out to scare somebody and grab for treats everywhere. Gossie goes as a wizard, and it's fowl play for Gertie, costumed as a chicken. BooBoo is a fuzzy bunny rabbit, and Peedie does his darndest to be a dragon.

Little Ollie, the odd man out, trails along behind, wrapped as a mummy, while the rest of the gaggle find treats in the pumpkin patch, the beehive, the haystacks, and the standing cornstalks. Ollie falls even farther behind as the other goslings hoot and howl and stop to bob in a bucket of apples.

But wee Ollie spots a ghost just hanging around in barn door and greets him in his own language-- BOO!-- and gaggles at a gang of grinning jack-o'-lanterns.

Whooooo! The wind rises, thunder crackles, and a spooky scarecrow sways in the breeze, and Gossie, Gertie, BooBoo, and Peedie sprint for the shelter of their barn to scarf down their remaining treats.

But Ollie has gotten into the autumn ambiance and takes his time hiking home, so that the other little goslings are already zoned out on candy and dozing by the time he arrives. But when he piles his share of goodies between them, the goslings wake and go for Ollie's offerings, ready to share his haul. It's an outstanding Halloween outing for all!

Oliver Dunrea's trick-or-treat tale, Ollie's Halloween (Gossie & Friends) (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013), is all ready for Halloween, dressed up this year as a new board book edition which boasts all of the goslings in a group adventure, with all the trappings--fake ghosts, pumpkins galore, wind-borne leaves flying, and a dark and stormy night for the setting, all done up in his trademark cute-as-a-button illustrations, set against bright white mid-page in a wash of watercolor. A fine first Halloween story which introduces the traditions of the scary season without the scare to young spooks.

For a pair of fine fowl stories, pair this one with Tad Hill's Halloween adventure, Duck & Goose, Find a Pumpkin (Oversized Board Book) (see my review here.)

Don't Mess with MAMA! Mo Willems Presents... That Is Not A Good Idea by Mo Willems

"WHAT LUCK! DINNER!"

A dapper fox, obviously on the prowl, practically twirls his mustache and licks his chops as he spies a tempting and tasty entre, a guileless-looking, blue-babuska-wearing goose, clutching her wicker shopping basket.

He gallantly invites her for stroll and she demurely accepts.  The melodrama ratchets up incrementally, as she in turn accepts the suggestion for a walk in the woods and a visit to the foxy gentleman's kitchen, where he engagingly begins to prepare their lunch, a savory soup in an alarmingly large stock pot.

So ... you think you know where this one is going?

Well, not with the wickedly wry Mo Willems as the director of this little one-reeler thriller.

Casting his little melodrama in the format of a silent film short subject, Mo Willems provides medium shots of the Fox and his quarry with closeups of the unsuspecting stooge goose coyly concurring, alternating with gray-toned title frames in which six little goslings act as a Greek chorus, with appropriately fateful prophecies.

"THAT IS NOT A GOOD IDEA!"

The warning subtitles become increasingly dire, with considerable overacting by the juveniles, as Fox's nefarious plot thickens, until at last he invites Goose to come closer to the simmering pot to taste for that elusive missing ingredient!

"THAT IS REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY NOT A GOOD IDEA!"

But the seemingly hapless hen turns the tables on this well-turned-out scoundrel in a climactic tour de force that has the reader suddenly realizing whom+ those warnings were really for, in Mo Willems' latest, That Is Not a Good Idea! (Balzer & Bray, 2013). Willems ends this little tale of peril with a final frame showing the goose and her chicks enjoying a savory soup with, um, just the right missing ingredient. Willems puts the silent film format to perfect use here, with each page a frame of a hand-cranked short subject, with a conclusion that would have his foxy villain (were he not otherwise engaged in, er, seasoning the soup) crying "Curses! Foiled again!"

Roll credits!

How Willems manages to continue to top himself with each flawless picture book would confound even the Keystone Kops. With a few well-chosen facial expression lines and telling body language, peerless page pacing, and a wry wit that wins over all ages, this winner of multiple Caldecotts and Theodor Seuss Geisel Awards shows yet again that he is indeed the master of picture-book craft.

As Publishers Weekly puts it cunningly and punningly, "a wickedly droll poultry-in-peril yarn."