Book Description
for Nobody's Duck by Mary Sullivan
From Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)
A duck camped out in an alligator’s front yard claims to belong to nobody. Sure that can’t be true, and annoyed by the duck’s persistent presence, the alligator loads the duck and its comically ample collection of hats into a wagon and heads out. At each stop (library, movie theater, go-kart track, skydiving company), the alligator asks, “Is this your duck?” At each stop, after careful scrutiny, the queried animal replies, with increasing degree of emphasis, in the negative. And at each stop, the duck engineers an adventure, checking out books, and purchasing two admissions to the movie ( Dogzilla ), the go-karts, and skydiving in turn. By day’s end, it’s been a wild ride (and drop from the sky) for the alligator. As for the duck, it has an answer at last to the alligator’s persistent question: “I am your duck!” Reflecting on the day, the alligator knows it’s true. Absurdly funny, much of this story plays out in the details of the comic-style illustrations, but the spare, speech bubble dialogue is perfect. (Ages 3–8)
CCBC Choices 2019. © Cooperative Children's Book Center, Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison, 2019. Used with permission.