Miss Malarkey Doesn't Live in Room 10

Happy Thursday!   Time for another Easy Picture Books roundup and I have three cute ones today.   First author Judy Fichler and illustrator Kevin O’Malley have teamed up to produce Miss Malarkey Doesn’t Live In Room 10.   A young first grade boy is convinced his teacher, Miss Malarkey, lives at school right there in her classroom.  So he is very surprised when Miss Malarkey moves into his own apartment building, where he lives with his Mom and Dad.    He tells the other children that Miss Malarkey doesn’t live in room 10, but they don’t believe him until he shows them.   As the book ends the boy notes that school will soon be over for the summer and that next year he’ll be in second grade.   And he is pretty sure his second grade teacher lives in Room 12.    Recommended.

Jez Alborough is a prolific author/illustrator of Easy Picture books and I have previously praised his 2003 release Some Dogs Do.   This 1995 volume Hit The Ball Duck, was somewhat less satisfying.   While Alborough’s colorful, imaginative illustrations featuring animal characters in outrageous situations were pleasing as always,  this book’s plot is so very simple as to feel strained.   The animals are playing baseball and Duck hits the ball into a tree.   The animals then climb up on top of each other in a big stack to get the gear back down.   And the ball falls fromm the tree, is caught by the Frog and the book ends as Duck is declared "Out!".    Not Recommended.

I’ve previously written about David Shannon’s delightful picture book No, David! and today am featuring Shannon’s David Gets In Trouble, a title very much in the same vein.  There seem to be just no end of ways that young David can get into trouble, for which he is always, it seems, apologizing or being reprimanded.   From smiling wickedly in the class picture to pulling the cat’s tail, from spilling a soda to spoiling the pretty birthday cake David just always seems to get in trouble.   A very cute book.   Recommended.   Please come back tomorrow for another book review here on The Thin Red Line.