Wrong Way

PreS-Gr 1—This book has lively watercolor illustrations and charming ducks, but the text is wordy and confusing. It focuses on three baby ducks: obedient Right Way and Your Way, and their brother, Wrong Way, who clearly marches to the beat of a different drummer. Despite nearly getting hit by a car and then getting lost, the independent duckling eventually joins the rest of the family at the pond. Their mother instructs her children to slide into the water gently and kick their legs as fast as they can. Wrong Way makes a big show of jumping in and swims on his back. "That's the wrong way to cross the pond," says his mother. The duckling replies, "It's just different and it's fun." The story ends with Mother Duck suggesting that she change his name to My Way. This is supposed to be an affirming message but one has to wonder why a parent would name a child Wrong Way to begin with. Stick with Jonathan Emmett's Ruby in Her Own Time (Scholastic, 2004) or Jane Simmons's Come Along, Daisy! (Little, Brown, 1998) for stories about ducks with minds of their own.—Kathy Buchsbaum, Hewlett-Woodmere Public Library, NY