Shall we play the escape the bookstore game?”
From School Library Journal In a delightful reunion of the seven animal friends from Surprise Party (Macmillan, 1986), Hutchins again creates a satisfying tale of anticipation. Frog and Duck want to play but can’t think of a game, so they search for Fox to ask for help, and so it goes until the animals seek Owl’s advice. In their childlike naivete, they don’t realize that Owl has been watching them the whole time, and when he suggests a game of “Hide and Seek,” they enthusiastically agree. A simple enough text is made appropriately complicated by the accompanying illustrations. Children will love joining the search for each subsequent animal friend, the tail of which peeks tantalizingly from the corner of the page where the animals are looking. The cumulative and circular design of the text–the last animal found always finds the next one–also gives children reassuring clues to the location of the next animal being sought. The illustrations, although similar to those in Surprise Party
