Busy Little Mouse

Steve Pitt is a Toronto-based freelance writer and an award-winning journalist. He has written many young adult and children's books, including Day of the Flying Fox: The True Story of World War II Pilot Charley Fox.

In a quiet little barnyard, all the cute little animals are quiet and
minding their own business. Then along comes a busy little mouse who
bumps into a bouncy dog, setting off a chain reaction that soon has the
whole barnyard in an uproar. The bouncy dog wants to play with a wiggly
pig and goes “Woof! Woof!” The wiggly pig goes “Oink! Oink!” and
soon all creatures great and small are getting into the act.

This wonderful little tale is the result of another collaboration by
the award-winning mother–daughter writing–illustration team Eugenie
and Kim Fernandes. In this volume, the senior Fernandes is responsible
for the playful rhymes that capture a young reader’s attention and
bounce it along like a balloon in a playful breeze. Kim supplies the
incredible illustrations made of colored clay. Each illustration panel
is an intricate three-dimensional world that seems ready to rise up off
the page and land on the reader’s lap. Besides illustrating
Eugenie’s verse perfectly, Kim includes humorous details like
mouse-sized furniture and minor characters such as the spiders watching
from the corners of a barn stall. This is one of those books that
toddlers and parents will happily read over and over again. Highly
recommended.