GORILLA! GORILLA!
by Jeanne Willis & illustrated by Tony Ross
This colorful work, rendered in pastels, is another collaboration between the team that made readers laugh at Tadpole’s Promise (2005). Here the subject is the suspenseful chase of a mother mouse by a killer gorilla as she searches for her lost baby. The refrain, “Help! Help! He’ll catch me! / He’ll squash me and scratch me, / He’ll mince me and mash me, / And crunch me up for lunch!” is heard throughout as she travels around the world with the gorilla close behind. Ross cleverly introduces a variety of countries, landscapes and transportation, while portraying humorous situations of the native animals. In China, a panda is eating his bamboo dinner with chopsticks, and a chipmunk wearing a ten-gallon hat appears in western America. The expression of the gorilla is especially sweet as he presents the mother mouse with her baby in the Arctic and asks from whom she is running. Utterly embarrassed, she allows the gorilla to carry both her and the baby back home to the rainforest, gently teaching the folly of a rush to judgment. Illustrations are ideal for group readings. (Picture book. 3-6)