The hiccupotamus

There are times when you just can't shake the hiccups. For a purple hippopotamus, every time he got'emus . . . / He'd fall upon his bottomus. The poor hippo startles an elephant when attempting to say hellophant and accidentally wraps up everyone (rhino, centipede, and elephant) in dental floss that is the final strawcerous. The hippo is spun, dunked in water, and tickled. The band of animals even secured him to a buffalo / And made him huff and puffalo into a paper bag. Finally he is cured! Relief is brief as the hippo's friends now have the hic . . . hic . . . hiccups. The conclusion of this rhyming escapade features a whimsical biographical sheet on the cast of characters ( The part of the buffalo was played by a ground squirrel named Arlo ). Zenz's colored pencils create saturated spreads of cartoon art that sometimes seem a bit two-dimensional, though his use of line complements the playful text with curves and rounded characters. The catchy rhyme will help even the worst case of hiccups.--Cox, Ernie Copyright 2009 Booklist

"There was a hippopotamus / Who hiccupped quite-a-lotamus / And every time he got'emus... / He'd fall upon his bottomus." This hippo's hiccups disturb a yellow elephant, who chases him into a centipede's construction zone. Elephant and centipede chase poor hippo past a flossing rhino, and everyone gets tangled up in the dental floss. Deciding to be less angry and more the good Samaritans, theygive up the chase. "They tried to find a therapy / Some cure which they could shareapy, / A what or why or whereapy / To stop this long nightmareapy." The group tries spinning, paper bags, scaring, submersion and vinegar until...a miracle! Hippo's hiccups are cured...but he seems to have passed them on. Bright, pudgy, round-eyed cartoon illustrations rendered in colored pencil are an apt match for the goofy slapstick of the text. Illustrator Zenz's first solo outing is Seussian silliness for the storytime set. The final page features cast biographies with humor aimed at grown-up readers. Fun for all. (Picture book. 2-7) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.