Review: A simple lesson about grooming
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 09 10, 2013
Leela Hope has real talent for writing  and designing stories that are fun to read (her format is the use of rhyming verses) so popular with children), imaginative in imagery, and gently carry lessons about hygiene that children can understand and appreciate.Claire is a little girl with beautiful curly soft hair, so beautiful that she and her mother spend a significant time together brushing their hair. But the routine gets tiresome for Claire and she decides to stop washing and brushing her hair despite the jokes made by her friends and her mother's pleading - and sure enough, her hair become so dirty and tangled that her pet mouse Stan sets up house in the mess. Frightened and disgusted she realizes that her mother is right about keeping her beautiful hair clean and brushed to keep mice from nesting on her head - and to look and feel pretty again. Claire has learned her lesson about hygiene and following parental instructions and once again finds pleasure in her beautiful clean brushed curly hair.The rhyming story is fun to read, graceful to hear read aloud, and is accompanied by very fine illustrations.  This is an entertaining book with a message, just the sort of books children appreciate and love to read and hear. Grady Harp, September13