Interrupting Cow

July 15, 2020
A cow comedian seeks out a willing audience for her signature knock-knock joke. While the other cows in the barn graze on hay for breakfast, Daisy--known to the others as Interrupting Cow--begins her routine. "Knock, knock," she says. "Who's there?" they reply. And so the back-and-forth goes until Interrupting Cow interrupts "Interrupting Cow wh--" with a loud "MOO!" She falls "onto the barn floor in helpless giggles" while the other cows run away. She follows them, but the cows ignore her and refuse to play. So Interrupting Cow gives up and visits the duck pond instead. She tells her joke from start to finish, falling "backward into the water with helpless laughter" when she reaches the punchline "MOO!" But when Interrupting Cow recovers, the ducks are gone. The same thing happens with the horses, the chickens, the pigs, the goats, and even the lone donkey. What gives? Her joke isn't that bad, is it? Yolen's sidesplitting early-reader series opener cleverly personifies the misunderstood subject of the classic joke. (Interrupting Cow and the Chicken Crossing the Road is due out in December 2020.) Dreidemy's full-color illustrations add to the hilarity with expressive cartoon character designs. With a total vocabulary of fewer than 200 words--including lots of synonyms--and at most nine lines per page, the text stays accessible to emerging readers. The most difficult word, "interrupting," is even spelled out phonetically. (This book was reviewed digitally with 9-by-12-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.) A barrel--or, rather, a barn--of laughs. (Early reader. 5-7)

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