Big Rig Rescue! (Big Rescue)

by Chris Gall

Overview

Chris Gall gives truck books a fresh set of wheels in a bright story of wreckers, tools, towing, and teamwork.

When a semi-truck crashes in the snow, Big Orange is ready. With a crane, chains, a webbing strap, outriggers, and a winch, Orange will get the semi back on its wheels—and when the job is too tough to tackle alone, Big Blue is there to help. Together they get the semi free and upright. Now, Orange is ready to tow the semi back to the shop, but a storm is coming.?.?.?.?Good thing Blue is around to help when Orange hits ice!

With lively storytelling and engaging artwork, acclaimed author-illustrator Chris Gall motors through a brave and stormy tale of big-rig gadgets and collaboration.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781324015406
Publisher:	Norton Young Readers
Publication date:	01/05/2021
Series:	Big Rescue
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	32
File size:	7 MB
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Chris Gall is the award-winning author and illustrator of several children’s books, including Big Rig Rescue! and Dinotrux, a Publisher's Weekly Best Children’s Book of the year that inspired a Netflix original TV series. He lives in Tucson, Arizona.

Editorial Reviews

11/16/2020

A semi “haulin’ tons of scrap” has rolled over in a swirling snowstorm. The driver is unhurt, but getting this big rig cleared off the road is going to take some serious towing muscle. First on the scene is 14-wheeler Big Orange, whose bearded, pale-skinned driver narrates the story. After ensuring safety at the site (“A tanker arrives to drain the fuel”) and slicing through a twisted guardrail (“I love my metal-cutting rescue saw”), the narrator tries to lift the trailer with strategically placed airbags and winching—one of many vivid procedural scenes. But the toppled rig refuses to budge until another tow truck, Big Blue, arrives, piloted by a tan-skinned figure with a long ponytail and pink gloves. The two drivers hook cables onto either side of the semi, and with some get-’er-done engineering (“We run my line through a snatch block on the trailer to give us extra power”), the semi is righted (“Great roll, everyone!”), and it’s back onto the icy road. Gall’s (Jumbo: The Making of the Boeing 747) storytelling is as muscular as the rigs he celebrates: precisionist-style renderings continually move around and over the scene to satisfy the curiosity of truck aficionados, while detail-rich, matter-of-fact prose honors their enthusiasm and knowledge. Ages 3–5. Agent: Erica Rand Silverman, Stimola Literary. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

2020-11-18
Rescue vehicles meet a complex problem with some seriously adult tools.

There’s a wreck on the highway! Snowy conditions have left a semi on its side, the scrap it was hauling spilling out at the rear. Good thing Big Orange is on the job. This tow truck has “14 wheels, a boom, a hook, and….Oh yes. A winch!” But this isn’t a job it can do alone. The driver needs a tanker to drain the semi’s fuel and a second rig called Big Blue to help get that semi in an upright position. That done, a new flatbed will drive away with the trailer, and what’s left will head off to the repair shop. That is, until a patch of black ice makes a new rescue mission necessary. Texture comes primarily in the form of snow on an icy winter’s day. Otherwise, Gall’s art has a Playmobil’s smooth feel, rendering trees as perfect cones and human figures little more than foils to the equipment they wield. (All humans have pale skin, though a couple are slightly browner than the driver of Big Orange.) From the rescue saw through the outriggers to the trailer’s snatch block, the solution to the semi’s problem may prove just as fascinating to adult readers as their truck-loving offspring. Most specialized vocabulary is set in boldface and italicized, but not, maddeningly, that snatch block, nor is it clear what exactly that particular piece of equipment is.

Look to the helpers in this love song to rescue vehicles in cold, remote places. (Picture book. 3-7)

Kirkus Reviews