Little Miss Muffet Counts to Ten
Kindergarten-Grade 2—It all begins with the traditional nursery rhyme until…spider asks Little Miss Muffet to stay and she does. Before long she is surrounded by two lemurs with streamers, three magpies with bow-ties, four foxes with boxes, five pussycats wearing party hats, six poodles carrying noodles, seven bears setting up tables and chairs, eight puffins bearing blueberry muffins, and nine gibbons bringing balloons tied with ribbons. Then 10 crocodiles wearing greedy smiles arrive with a big box. The frightened Miss Muffet is delighted to discover they have brought her a birthday cake, and a party ensues. The text is spot-on as Clark keeps the rhyming pattern of the original nursery rhyme and makes it her own. As the story progresses, readers will wonder who will show up next, what will they bring, and, more importantly, why. The whimsical illustrations show plenty of activity as the number of characters increases, but they never descend into overwhelming busyness and many invite closer inspection. Perfect for storytime or individual sharing.—Catherine Callegari, Gay-Kimball Library, Troy, NHCopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.