Nanette's Baguette

by Mo Willems, Mo Willems (Illustrator)

Overview

Today is the day Nanette gets to get the baguette! Is she set? YOU BET!


Mo Willems’ hilarious new picture book, Nanette’s Baguette, follows our plucky heroine on her first big solo trip to the bakery. But . . . will Nanette get the baguette from baker Juliette? Or will Nanette soon be beset with regret?

Set in a meticulously handcrafted-paper-modeled French village, the uniquely vibrant laugh-out-loud world of Nanette’s Baguette may be Mo’s best creation yet. Get set to krack into an irresistible tale you won’t soon forget!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781484722862
Publisher:	Disney Publishing Group
Publication date:	10/25/2016
Pages:	40
Sales rank:	45,940
Product dimensions:	11.30(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.60(d)
Lexile:	AD430L (what's this?)
Age Range:	3 - 5 Years

About the Author

Mo Willems (www.pigeonpresents.com), a New York Times #1best-selling author and illustrator, has been awarded a Caldecott Honor on three occasions, for Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!, Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale, and Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity. The celebrated Elephant & Piggie early-reader series has been awarded the Theodor Seuss Geisel Medal on two occasions (for There Is a Bird on Your Head! and Are You Ready to Play Outside?) as well as garnering five Geisel Honors (for We Are in a Book!, I Broke My Trunk!,Let’s Go for a Drive!, A Big Guy Took My Ball! and Waiting Is Not Easy!).



See above.

Editorial Reviews

07/18/2016
Three-time Caldecott Honor–recipient Willems celebrates the allure of fresh-baked bread in this tale of good intentions. Nanette is a French schoolgirl in a quaint straw hat and plaid skirt. (Ce n’est pas gentil to depict her as a frog, peut-être, even if the national allusion is lost on the readership.) Her mother hands her a coin and sends her to the bakery: “Getting to get the baguette is Nanette’s biggest responsibility yet. Is Nanette set to get the baguette? You bet!” She sees four friends, but cannot linger: “ ‘Gotta jet! I’ve got a baguette to get,’ says Nanette to the quartet.” Baker Juliette sells Nanette a loaf, and the girl samples a warm bite. Across four explosive spreads, punctuated by the “krack! krack!” of crunching, Nanette devours the treat, then droops home “beset with regret.” Willems builds multimedia collages of cut paper, comic illustrations, and photos, escalating from calm rectangular panels to pointed, starry shapes. His goofy wordplay and onomatopoeic display type amplify the hilarity, and temptation is demonstrably forgiven in a funny coda: Nanette’s mother finds baguettes just as irresistible. Ages 3–5. Agent: Marcia Wernick, Wernick & Pratt. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

★ 10/01/2016
PreS-Gr 2—The hilarious account of how Nanette, a young frog entrusted with her "biggest responsibility yet" ends up "beset with regret." Although Nanette meets her friends and "Mr. Barnett with his pet" on the way to buy a baguette for the first time by herself, she doesn't forget her task and emerges triumphant from the bakery. But the loaf is warm and "smells wonderful," and bite by bite, she devours it before she reaches home. Nanette's fear of facing her mom proves unfounded, though, when she admits her mistake and is enfolded in her mother's soothing embrace. The two set out together to get another baguette, and a surprise ending demonstrates that even adults can succumb to temptation. With few exceptions, the entire text contains words rhyming with Nanette. The French village, handcrafted with cardboard and paper and digitally integrated with other photographed illustrations, is home to Nanette and her frog community. Visual jokes fill every page: the pictures on the walls of Nanette's home, Mr. Barnett's pet, signs in a shop window. With lip-smacking delight, Nanette floats through double-page splashes of vibrant color as she consumes the baguette, then appears in a bull's-eye, eyes popping, mouth twisted, as she realizes her error. The background echoes her distress as it becomes dark and filled with black squiggles and the "KABOOM" of a thunderstorm, which leaves the girl "wet with no baguette." There is so much to discover and enjoy in this treat for eye and ear—even a hidden Pigeon. VERDICT For a storytime treat that children will devour, don't miss this shopping trip.—Marianne Saccardi, Children's Literature Consultant, Cambridge, MA

School Library Journal

★ 2016-08-02
Hilarious complications ensue when Nanette’s mom gives her the responsibility of buying the family baguette. She sets out on her errand and encounters lots of distractions along the way as she meets and greets Georgette, Suzette, Bret with his clarinet, Mr. Barnett and his pet, Antoinette. But she remembers her mission and buys the baguette from Juliette the baker. And oh, it is a wonderful large, warm, aromatic hunk of bread, so Nanette takes a taste and another and more—until there is nothing left. Maybe she needs to take a jet to Tibet. But she faces her mother and finds understanding, tenderness, and a surprise twist. Willems is at his outlandish best with line after line of “ettes” and their absurd rhymes, all the while demonstrating a deep knowledge of children’s thought processes. Nanette and the entire cast of characters are bright green frogs with very large round eyes, heavily outlined in black and clad in eccentric clothing and hats. A highly detailed village constructed of cardboard forms the background for Nanette’s adventures. Her every emotion explodes all over the pages in wildly expressive, colorful vignettes and an eye-popping use of emphatic display type. The endpapers follow the fate of the baguette from fresh and whole to chewed and gone. Demands for encores will surely follow. Laugh-out-loud fun for all. (Picture book. 3-6)

Kirkus Reviews