PENGUINS

This lackluster effort features a jolly group of zoo penguins enjoying their favorite activity—entertaining and being entertained by humans—when they get a surprise: A little girl drops her camera into their habitat. Once all the visitors have left the zoo for the day, a little penguin takes up the object and figures out how to operate it. Soon all of the penguins are taking turns mugging for the camera and shooting pictures. Eventually, the camera is returned to the little girl, and she gets a surprise of her own when she develops the pictures and finds that most of them are shots of the goofy penguins hamming it up. While the vivid colors and grinning penguins, one of which is chomping or preparing to chomp on a bright green fish in every panel, may hold the attention of preschoolers, the predictable story and plodding prose will not. Even the novelty features—a viewfinder page and a set of photographs—cannot save this one. (Picture book. 3-6)