Edmund the Elephant Who Forgot

Gr 2-4–Edmund is a forgetful elephant. His mother teaches him a rhyme about how elephants always remember. The jaunty rhyme is cute, but, as demonstrated when Edmund forgets his mother’s shopping list and every item on it, it doesn’t actually help him remember. Enter Colin the Cricket, who overheard the list and had a great memory. Unfortunately, Colin is either very quiet or Edmund is an elephant with big ears and terrible hearing. A series of humorous misunderstandings leads to Edmund collecting a baboon named Betty and a piano-playing turtle instead of confetti and his Aunt Myrtle. The book has an ironic ending, with Edmund’s mother having forgotten to hand out party invitations. Thankfully, Edmund has brought half the town’s animal residents home with him, leading to a huge shindig. There is no moral lesson in the end—just a party. Lundie has a rich color palette, clean lines, and a gift for creating zany, madcap scenes. It all culminates in a glorious spread of the menagerie at play.