Daddy Adventure Day

PreS-Gr 1—A boy eagerly awaits a ball-game outing with his father. He wakes up in the wee hours of the morning and cheekily rolls his father's old baseballs down the stairs, commenting, "I don't know how he can sleep on such an exciting day." His father makes other changes to his daily routine: "'There's no reading the paper on a Daddy Adventure Day,' Mommy reminds him," and "calling work" is also against the rules. At the stadium, the boy is awestruck by the sights and sounds. From their vantage point, the "grass looks like a green checkerboard." The day includes lots of thrills, from catching a foul ball to sharing a banana split. Ramá's watercolor and digital collage illustrations capture the warm relationship between the wide-eyed boy and his ever-patient dad (who suffers through hot chocolate and root beer spills on his pants). A satisfying story about spending time with loved ones.—Linda Ludke, London Public Library, Ontario, Canada