Brian P. Cleary is the author of the Words Are CATegorical(R), Math
Is CATegorical(R), Food Is CATegorical(TM), and Animal Groups Are
CATegorical(TM) series, as well as several picture books. He lives
in Cleveland, Ohio.
Steve Mack is a children's book and greeting card illustrator. He
lives in Lumsden, Saskatchewan, Canada, with his wife and two
children.
"Anyone who struggles with Dr. Seuss' Fox in Socks (1965) will
enjoy these silly sentences that simply must be read out loud.
Since the sentences are short, they look easy, but overconfident
readers beware: it'd be hard enough to pronounce all these words
correctly, even without humor adding to the challenge, especially
in one case about 'kissing quickly'--name a six-year-old who
doesn't giggle at kissing. Colorful, stylized illustrations feature
human and animal characters, and each image and sentence form a
discrete package, one to a page or to a spread. Occasional details
in the pictures are hilarious, especially the one for 'Tim and his
thin twin sister, Trish, twice tricked their thick sitter, '
showing giraffe kids dangling a spider over a panicking hippo
babysitter, who is about to sit on a tiny whoopee cushion that
emits 'poot!' in tiny type. The title twister, which closes the
collection, is reminiscent of Joanna Cole and Stephanie Calmenson's
Six Sick Sheep (1993). A note at the end offers suggestions for
aspiring tonguetwister creators." --Booklist--Journal
"Readers who take this on should prepare their tongues for a wicked
tangling...and their stomach muscles for a workout. A quick look at
some of Cleary's sentences can be deceiving--seemingly simple
syllables are truly tongue twisting when read aloud: 'The water in
Flo's Inn flows in frozen.' Others, however, look tricky right from
the start: 'Few knew that Mr. Froo flew in the fleshy, freshly
fried fish from Florida.' From the silly and ridiculous to the
everyday, this tongue-twister collection covers a wide variety of
topics. Ever the educator, the author's backmatter includes some
great tips for creating tongue twisters, breaking down for readers
just what makes them so difficult to say. Mack's brightly colored
madcap cartoon illustrations match the tongue-in-cheek humor of the
text. 'The ghostly moans were mostly groans' pictures a child ghost
wildly protesting having to rake the leaves while his unimpressed
father stands by, arms crossed. And it's tough to beat the
silliness of slightly cross-eyed and buck-toothed men in sandals
and togas playing basketball: 'See the Greek geeks as they shoot
three free throws.' Not for the faint of heart; tongues should
really be limbered up before tackling these." --Kirkus
Reviews--Journal
"This high-energy collection of pleasantly rhythmic tongue twisters
features a screwball cast of cartoon animals rendered in digital
collages. Characters include a long-eared, lovestruck dog ('Miss
Tish made a quick list of/ those she'd kissed quickest') and a pair
of hungry bears excitedly awaiting their meal at a restaurant. 'Few
knew that Mr. Froo flew in the/ fleshy, freshly fried fish from
Florida.' An appended guide provides tips for creating effective
tongue twisters―something readers are likely to try out once they
master the satisfying sounds of these silly, slippery, serpentine
selections." --Publishers Weekly--Journal
"Tongue twisters constitute one of the few challenges in which
failure is as much fun as accomplishment, and here Cleary offers
two dozen originals that should reduce the most eloquent youngster
to a state of giggling babble 'The TV was fee-free for channel 3';
'Few knew that Mr. Froo flew in the fleshy, freshly fried fish from
Florida.' Not all selections are equally pithy, and several try a
little too hard to pack in as many tangling terms as possible
without actually upping the difficulty much ('Nan's knapsack straps
sat on the striped steps'). Mack's goofy digitally rendered cartoon
cast manages, however, to turn even the most sense-straining ditty
into a literal performance. While this can't match Jon Agee's
Orangutan Tongs (BCCB 4/09) for cleverness or panache, it does
feature the welcome bonus of a page of 'Make Your Own Tongue
Twisters' suggestions, featuring letter combinations, initial
sounds, and ending letters that are most likely to induce verbal
meltdown. Surely there's a phonics lesson in here somewhere." --The
Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books--Journal
"A pleased penguin takes a shower as 'The water in Flo's Inn flows
in frozen.' A Christmas elf faces down a menacing dog: 'Sammy
stammered as he told the stray in the sleigh to stay.' Brightly
colored, bold-hued pictures add clarity and humor. An appended
'Make Your Own Tongue Twister' page helpfully provides letter
combinations that 'can be particularly difficult to pronounce.'"
--The Horn Book Guide--Journal
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