FICTION

Absolutely One Thing: Featuring Charlie and Lola

by Lauren CHILD
illus. by Lauren Child. 32p. Candlewick. Apr. 2016. Tr $17.99. ISBN 9780763687281.
COPY ISBN
PreS-Gr 1—Charlie and Lola are going to the store with their mother to choose a treat: "One thing EACH, which means TWO actual things." Of course, Lola manages to complicate and delay the process, counting ladybugs, feeding ducks, and bartering with Mom while Charlie tries to herd his sister to the store. As usual, Child encapsulates zany child logic in the character of Lola while Charlie plays the straight man. The line drawings and textured mixed-media illustrations are as sunny and energetic as those in Child's other books. The layout is busy, with a dizzying variety of fonts. Plenty of math is squeezed into the text, but the joy of numbers is conveyed much more effectively than any specific calculation technique.
VERDICT A must-buy for preschool and early elementary math collections, as well as for Charlie and Lola fans.
Reviewed by Rachel Anne Mencke, St. Matthew's Parish School, Pacific Palisades, CA
After their mother tells them they can choose "one thing each" at the store, winningly ditzy younger sister Lola gabbles with patient-as-can-be older brother Charlie on the subject of counting ("How many shoes would fifty or twenty-seventeen ladybugs need, Charlie?"). The story line treads water, but fans of Charlie and Lola books, with their exuberant graphics and typefaces, probably won't notice.
 , Apr 01, 2016

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