This highly imaginative book features a beautiful little girl who is pretending to be a bear as she goes around the house. The narrative voice is the link between what we as the reader sees and what she is imagining.
On the first page, we see her hiding under a tent made of blankets, with another blanket, brown and heavy, draped around her to be her fur. “You’re a gruff bear, with fleas – a grump, with a hump between your shoulders. Scramble from your hidden ledge – hidden by a bramble hedge – and squeeze between the boulders.”
She sneaks up on her father, who is raiding the fridge. “Ramble through the midnight breeze. Then – freeze! You’re a bold bear with a nose as cold as cheese.”
Later, after dinner, she takes her bath. “Wish for fish! Stand in the sand by a stream. In a pool you’ll see reflections of your drool. You’ll see floppy lips – and underneath, scary teeth that gleam and glimmer. Above your ears the moon will tip and sink into a cloud and shimmer as you dip and drink. And dunk your snout. Shake those hairy hips to spook the trout! Then drip and dribble out.”
Her bedtime routine continues, all the while pretending to be a bear, fluffy in a towel after the bath, rolling on her back to put on her slippers like bears roll in the grass.
“You’re a tired grizzly – who’s dizzly spun and sung, who’s busily eaten rows of unhatched flies, made footprints on the beach unmatched in size. Soon the sun will rise on the horizon. Eyes glitter in the woods and blink; they’re watching you, the groggy grizzly who’s snooped and snacked and had a drink. And gotten soggy. And now is pooped and ready to roam home.”
She climbs into her bed and drifts off to sleep, clutching her stuffed monkey.
I enjoyed the way this book celebrates the powerful imagination of a child and seeks to build up that creativity instead of squelching it. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we all still had the imaginations we did as children?
(This book was published in 2003 by Alfred A. Knopf and was illustrated by Steve Johnson and Lou Fancher.)
Related Blogs:
Elliot’s Bath and Elliot’s Shipwreck