The Viper

by Lisa Thiesing, Lisa Thiesing (Illustrator)

Overview

Peggy the pig receives a mysterious call from the Viper, warning that he is coming in one year. Repeated calls count down the time and add to the suspense. Who is the Viper? Based on an old summer camp story.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780142501573
Publisher:	COOP Studios
Publication date:	07/28/2015
Series:	Puffin Easy-To-Read: Level 2
Pages:	48
Sales rank:	514,057
Product dimensions:	5.99(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.11(d)
Age Range:	6 - 8 Years

Editorial Reviews

"Teachers will like this for the cleverly integrated educational concepts; librarians will use it for story hours; parents will love seeing the familiar joke in print; and young readers will thrill to its mildly scary tone and funny ending."

"The climactic double-page spread has the chill of a Halloween nightmare, but it leads to an ending so silly that the story is sure to become part of family folklore."

From the Publisher

K-Gr 2-Thiesing has taken a story she heard years ago at summer camp and converted it into an easy-reader that is bound to appeal to children who love a spooky tale. Peggy Pig receives a phone call one Friday and hears a voice hissing, "I am zee Viper. I vill come in 1 year." At first she is unconcerned; bright illustrations portray her going through daily activities nonchalantly. But as the phone calls persist, fear creeps in. The Viper reminds her of his coming-"in 1 month," "in 1 veek," "in 3 days-." At the final countdown, the pages become black, showing only numerals of a digital clock and wide, anxious eyes. An eerie shadow on the window shade scares Peggy until she looks through the peephole and sees Willy the Window Wiper coming to do his yearly service on her home. There will be children who don't quite catch the humor at first reading, but once the joke is realized they will clamor to read it again to unsuspecting friends and adults. Few beginning readers are as good as this one to promote reading with expression. Librarians will appreciate a plug for dictionaries as Peggy looks up the word "viper." This book is absolutely delightful.-Anne Knickerbocker, Cedar Brook Elementary School, Houston, TX Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

School Library Journal

Writing a funny, original easy reader isn't easy, especially writing one that incorporates concepts of time, wrapped up in a spooky story (based on an old campfire tale). Using an old, old, old, joke as her base, Thiesing packs in all the time concepts covered in first-grade classrooms: the calendar, telling time, incremental lengths of time (from a year to minutes), and the old rhyme about "Thirty days has September." Peggy the pig receives regular mysterious phone calls over the course of a calendar year from a "husky, dusky voice" announcing that he is "zee Viper," and he "vill come" to her house in a month, then in a week, and so on, counting down to his arrival with increasingly delicious suspense. Peggy looks up the word "viper" in the dictionary (another classroom skill) and thus expects a scary snake to show up at a locked and barricaded door. In a delightfully funny groaner, zee Viper is window washer Willy the Wiemeraner, who announces to Peggy that he has "come to vipe your vindows!" Teachers will like this for the cleverly integrated educational concepts; librarians will use it for story hours; parents will love seeing the familiar joke in print; and young readers will thrill to its mildly scary tone and funny ending. Theising's cheerful, bright illustrations include lots of humorous details with a variety of formats that add to the story's momentum. (Easy reader. 5-8)

Kirkus Reviews