PUMPKIN ORANGE, PUMPKIN ROUND

Rhyming verses follow a group of cats for some pumpkin picking and carving fun before trick-or-treating.

“Pumpkin orange, / pumpkin round, / pumpkin hiding... / pumpkin found! // Pumpkin lifting, / pumpkin fall, / pumpkin rolling, / pumpkin ball!” The words that follow “pumpkin” are sometimes adjectives, sometimes nouns, at times an activity depicted, and occasionally references to actual pumpkins, making the illustrations essential for decoding, though they don’t always help with some of the vocabulary: “…gleaming…glow…glaring…show” is illustrated with the cats in front of their tree home, two jack-o’-lanterns lit up, and a kitten in a third one. The ending is especially satisfying, one larger cat giving a smaller one a hug while three others curl up with the largest gray cat on a sofa with a book: “Pumpkin tired, / pumpkin fed, / pumpkin story, / pumpkin bed.” Since every other word is “pumpkin,” the term will wear on many children much beyond the toddler stage long before the end, and a couple rhymes are rough: “mom” with “chum,” for example. The artwork, done with colored pencil and acrylic glaze, is both childlike and nicely textured, the six cats easily differentiated, especially the elder dark gray parental figure who wears half-moon specs. The rear endpapers give directions for carving a jack-o’-lantern, adults doing all the cutting after kids have drawn the facial features.

Cozy, repetitious autumn fun for toddlers and younger preschoolers.