Cornelius P. Mud, Are You Ready for Baby?
PreSchool-Grade 1—In his third picture-book outing, Cornelius P. Mud faces his biggest challenge yet: meeting his new baby brother. Like its predecessors, the book has a series of questions and answers, only this time Cornelius is the one asking the questions: "Can he play?" "Can he eat pizza?" "What CAN he do?" His sensitive mama answers all of them with love and patience. Saltzberg's delightfully childlike acrylic and pencil illustrations capture the trepidation of a youngster confronted with such a situation; Cornelius curls up in a corner of the room, as far from his mother and brother as possible, as he asks, "Do you love him more than you love me?," and his expression is the epitome of woe as he moans, "I wish we could send him back." At last he finds something the baby can do-be his little brother. Young readers will delight at Cornelius's "lullaby" for his new sibling: "When you're/a little older,/we will play…/BUT NOW/you're like a/lump of clay." Simultaneously sensitive and silly, this book hits all the right notes.—Kathleen Kelly MacMillan, Carroll County Public Library, MDCopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.