The Spring Rabbit

by Joyce Dunbar, Susan Varley

Overview

Smudge is the only rabbit in the woods without a brother or sister. His mother tells him to wait for spring, but that is a long way off. In the fall, Smudge builds a leaf-and-twig brother, but he blows away. He builds a snow sister in the winter, but she melts. Will Smudge's wish for a sibling ever come true?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781435164925
Publisher:	Sandy Creek
Publication date:	12/21/2016
Pages:	32
Product dimensions:	10.80(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	3 - 5 Years

About the Author

Joyce Dunbar has written more than 80 children's books, including the bestselling Tell Me Something Happy Before I Go to Sleep and Tell Me What It's Like to Be Big. Susan Varley is the illustrator of The Vole Who Would Be King and Why Is the Sky Blue?

Read an Excerpt

At last came the first signs of spring. All the twigs were sprouting green shoots and the buds were beginning to show.

Smudge went looking for his brother. He looked in the hollows of the trees, but he found no sign of a brother, only a mouse hole, full of baby mice.

"There are no rabbits here," said the mouse.

Editorial Reviews

PreS-K-A young rabbit wants a brother or sister. His mother replies, "`Wait until the spring.'" Naturally, that is too long to wait, so Smudge tries three sibling substitutes: a leaf-and-twig figure that blows away, a snow bunny that melts, and a mud rabbit that washes away. When spring finally arrives, Smudge finds a mousehole filled with baby mice, a robin standing guard over a nest filled with speckled eggs (strangely, they're brown, not blue), and frog parents sitting on a lily pad protecting their frogspawn. Smudge's mother then points out to her disappointed son, "`You were looking in all the wrong places.'" His family now includes two brothers and a sister, who later play around an enormous moss rabbit he builds for them. The comforting story is too predictable, bordering on bland. Varley's creature-filled wood is cozy, illustrated with full-page, pen-and-ink and watercolor paintings. Her style harks back to Beatrix Potter's work, but lacks subtlety and humor. A run-of-the-mill offering.-Jacqueline Elsner, Athens Regional Library, GA

School Library Journal

Smudge is the only rabbit in the woods without a brother or a sister. His mother tells him, "Wait until the spring." To get through the intervening seasons, Smudge makes himself companions--a leaf rabbit, a snow rabbit, a mud rabbit. But these friends can't chase and play and splash. In the spring, Smudge looks outdoors for the promised baby rabbit, but only when he comes home does he find what he's looking for--and then, not one, but three tiny bundles. The prose is tender, and the illustrations are wondrous depictions of gentle woodland life and domestic burrows. Cross the style of William Steig with that of E. H. Shepard, and you'll have a feel for these precise, sweet drawings. Even in a market crowded with bunny books, this one will be successful.

Mary Harris Veeder

"The prose is tender, and the illustrations are wondrous depictions of gentle woodland life and domestic burrows. Cross the style of William Steig with that of E. H. Shepard, and you'll have a feel for these precise, sweet drawings. Even in a market crowded with bunny books, this one will be successful."  —Booklist

From the Publisher