The stray dog

Marc Simont

Book - 2001

A family befriends a stray dog, names him Willy, and decides to keep him.

Saved in:

Children's Room Show me where

jE/Simont
1 / 1 copies available
Location Call Number   Status
Children's Room jE/Simont Checked In
Subjects
Genres
Picture books
Published
New York : HarperCollins 2001.
Language
English
Main Author
Marc Simont (-)
Other Authors
Reiko Sassa (-)
Physical Description
unpaged : ill
ISBN
9780060289348
Contents unavailable.
Review by Booklist Review

Ages 4^-8. With the tenderness found in his illustrations for Betsy Byars' My Brother, Ant (1996), Simont tells a picture-book story of a happy family and a stray. A scruffy little dog comes to join the family picnic. The children call him Willy and play with him all day. When it's time to go, their parents insist they must leave him. As they drive home in the dark toward the city's glittering lights, they think of Willy alone. Then a wry series of vignettes shows the mother, father, boy, and girl brooding and absentminded, each day of the week. On Saturday they arrive back at the picnic spot just in time to save Willy from the official dogcatcher. Simont's clear line-and-watercolor pictures are a delight. Everything is in the body language, from desolation to exuberance. At the end, there's no more empty white space, except around Willy's cozy bed, where he belongs. --Hazel Rochman

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by School Library Journal Review

PreS-Gr 2-Based on a friend's experience adopting a stray dog, Marc Simont has written and illustrated a gentle book (HarperCollins, 2001) about a stray that finds a loving home. When the family first saw Willy they played with him, but left him behind. The next week he was there again, however, and they saved him from the dog-catcher and brought him home with them. The story is simple, yet elegant. It speaks to the child in every reader. The narrator, William Dufris, creates different voices for each character. Light background music and the occasional barking dog sound effect add to the production. Considerable time is given between page-turn signals, perhaps so that readers have time to enjoy the illustrations. Listeners can hear the narrator turning the pages of his book before the official "page-turn signal" occurs. Despite this minor quibble, this is a sweet book that children will enjoy listening to as they read along.-Teresa Bateman, Brigadoon Elementary School, Federal Way, WA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review

(Primary) This picture book has all the earmarks of a classic. The story is simple: two children play with a stray dog while on a family picnic in the country one Saturday. They don't take him home (he might belong to someone else, say the parents), but the whole family thinks about him all week, and the next Saturday they return to the same picnic spot. The children save Willy (as they have named the dog) from the dogcatcher and adopt him, to everyone's satisfaction and joy. Now there's a plot that satisfies: as straightforward and cleanly shaped as, say, Harry the Dirty Dog or Corduroy. The text is spare-appropriately so, as the pictures are surpassingly eloquent. Not merely a showcase for the artist's (considerable) prowess with watercolors, they say something. An impressionistic, bird's-eye double-page spread of the family car crossing a bridge is breathtaking; it also tells us, wordlessly, that this is a city-dwelling family heading to the country for their picnic. The pacing is particularly impressive: in one spread, for instance, Simont gets through a whole week of action. One sentence, four spot illustrations, and-page turn-we're on to the next Saturday, and back at the fateful picnic spot. Here, the tension builds further (with the arrival of Willy, in a blur, being chased by the dogcatcher) until it is released and transformed into happy resolution (with Willy rescued and ensconced in his new home, even being introduced at the park ""to some very interesting dogs""). Having the children save Willy through their own ingenuity, by donating the girl's hair ribbon as a leash and the boy's belt as a collar, is almost a requirement of a good children's book; having the little boy's now-beltless shorts keep falling down is extra, and delightful. Overarching shape, knowledge of audience, small details-Simont gets it all right. This Stray Dog should find a home on library shelves and in readers' hearts everywhere. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.

(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.