CARMINE

The illustrator tries her hand at words and images in this delightful alphabet and fairytale twist. Carmine loves to make pictures, and she loves all the versions of the color red, like her name. When Granny calls and mentions she’s made alphabet soup (“beware of dangers”), Carmine takes her dog Rufus, her bike, her paints and paper and goes off to Gran’s, after promising not to “dilly-dally.” However, she cannot resist the call of some poppies, so the local “lurking” wolf does indeed get to Gran’s house first. When Carmine and Rufus get there—with her painting of poppies—things are quite the mess. But it’s only the soup bones the wolf was after, so Granny's released from the closet, she and Carmine finish the alphabet soup and Carmine goes home safely. Besides her vivacious paint and collage pictures, Sweet plays with her love of words by highlighting in alphabetical order, above and within the text, some unusual choices for an alphabet: “exquisite,” “nincompoop,” “zillion.” Includes Granny’s recipe for alphabet soup. (Picture book. 4-7)