Jack and Rick

by David McPhail, David McPhail (Illustrator)

Overview

Jack wants to play with Rick, and Rick wants to play with Jack—but there's a river between them. David McPhail reveals that friendship can bridge any river—and that when it comes to having fun, two is always better than one!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780152048594
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	07/01/2003
Series:	Green Light Readers Level 1
Edition description:	1-Simul
Pages:	24
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.12(d)
Lexile:	150L (what's this?)
Age Range:	4 - 7 Years

About the Author

DAVID McPHAIL is the creator of dozens of wonderful books, including Big Brown Bear's Up and Down Day, Sisters, and Mole Music, a New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated Book of the Year. He lives in New Hampshire. www.davidmcphail.com

DAVID McPHAIL is the creator of dozens of wonderful books, including Big Brown Bear's Up and Down Day, Sisters, and Mole Music, a New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated Book of the Year. He lives in New Hampshire. www.davidmcphail.com

Editorial Reviews

PreS-Gr 1-Two good choices for children who are just beginning to decode words and need to know that they can read a whole book. In Home, Matt, a squirrel, is new in the neighborhood and has no friends. When Pam (another squirrel) loses her hat, he catches it and returns it. Now, each of them has a new friend. The story is short and sweet, and good for the earliest readers. Each spread features one or two sentences against a white background on one side and a full-page illustration on the other. In Jack and Rick, a rabbit and a bear want to play together but are on opposite sides of a stream. Jack can't lift a tree limb to make a bridge so Rick throws him a rope so that they can pull the limb over. When Rick tries to cross the bridge, however, he falls in and his rabbit friend pulls him out. It's a simple plot about friends helping one another, with one sentence per page and a softly colored, uncluttered illustration above it. It is next to impossible to create an interesting plot using so few easy words. These titles succeed better than most.-Susan Lissim, Dwight School, New York City Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

School Library Journal

No one can beat McPhail (I Love You Because You're You, 2001, etc.) at illustrations of bears, and Rick the bear joins a long list of the artist's ursine charmers who can't fail to win over young readers. In this emergent-level easy reader, Rick meets a rabbit named Jack, but unfortunately, Rick and Jack are on opposite sides of the river. The two characters use a hollow log and Rick's jump-rope to explore the concept of cooperation, helping each other in simple but creative ways until they can join together on the same bank of the river to jump rope side by side. The text uses a question-and-answer format and just one simple sentence per page to tell the short but satisfying story, which has a real plot and real obstacles for the characters to overcome, despite the length. McPhail's delicately shaded watercolor illustrations show rotund Rick in an orange vest and jaunty Jack in a polka-dot neckerchief, with some hilarious expressions on the animals' faces as they struggle with the heavy log. Children who are just learning to sound out basic vocabulary will enjoy this amusing tale, one of several that McPhail has created for the Green Light easy reader series. (Easy reader. 5-7)

Kirkus Reviews