Editorial Reviews
From School Library Journal
PreSchool-Grade 1–Farmer McPhee delights in his grove of lemon trees. Each perfect lemon is tasty, tart, and, most importantly, yellow. His pride fairly bursts off the page, as does his outrage when he discovers a red lemon on one of his trees. He cannot imagine a world in which lemonade is red and cupcakes are crimson. In a fit of anger, he hurls the offending fruit across the sea to a distant island. Two hundred years pass and McPhees prized lemon tree groves are replaced by weeds. But on the island, a vibrant city has grown up around a grove of red lemon trees. As it turns out, these lemons are six times sweeter than yellow ones, and now people travel across oceans and seas to get them. Bold, enticing illustrations dominate the pages. Staake creates a fun, dynamic world reminiscent of Dr. Seusss in its sweeping arcs, bright colors, multicolored cartoon people, and effortlessly rhyming text. The circles used to create Farmer McPhee and his trees give the book a polished, graphic-arts feel. Pair this tangy tale with Laura Vaccaro Seegers Lemons Are Not Red (Roaring Brook, 2004) for a refreshing storytime combination.–Suzanne Myers Harold, Multnomah County Library System, Portland, OR
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
About the Author
Bob Staake, who grew up with Golden Books, is a former political cartoonist, a highly successful commercial artist, and the author and/or illustrator of many critically acclaimed books for children (Pigs Rock!; Hello, Robots; Little Golden Picture Dictionary) and adults (The Complete Book of Humorous Art).
A self-confessed workaholic who uses various styles, Staake’s award-winning commercial art has graced the pages of M
AD Magazine, Time, and The Washington Post.Staake has published with Viking and HarperCollins; his illustrations for the upcoming LGB,
I’M A TRUCK, debut in Spring ’06.The illustrator lives in Cape Cod, MA
