Horn Book (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

Fox-like animal friends One and Two, art supplies in hand, are working together to create "a sign for our new club!" Two more friends appear on the scene, contributing ideas, offering encouragement, and engaging in wordplay (including some decodable phonics). Membership is booming -- and the sign's real estate increasing -- but what actually is the club? The Pumphrey brothers, whose picture books (The Old Truck, rev. 3/20; The Old Boat, rev. 3/21) are so beautifully evocative and contemplative, here show off their sillier side, as befitting an Elephant & Piggie spinoff series entry. Color-coded, all-speech-bubble banter is snappily enjoyable and easy to comprehend, culminating in a very humorous, word-centric, twist ending. The art, made from "hand-cut foam stamps and colored digitally," features subdued hues (goldenrods and raspberries, with soft-blue backgrounds and lots of white space) and eye-pleasingly simple shapes. The friends are individuals, with unique colors and markings (including the number of splotches on their bushy tails), but united in enthusiasm for being together, creating art, and sharing their expertise. For example, One can't yet read but can sure fold a mean paper hat! Elissa Gershowitz

Kirkus Reviews

A squad of foxlike characters named One, Two, Kat, and Four start a club.None of them really has a firm idea of what the club should be called; still, their enthusiasm and wide-ranging talents are evident as they brainstorm. One cannot write but makes paper hats for everyone. Two, who knows every letter but can only write short words, creates a sign with the word a on it. Kat, who is able to write longer words as long as they rhyme with their own name, creates a sign with the word hat on it. Meanwhile, Four knows how to write "the perfect word for a club sign": club. Though the ideal club name should be obvious to the animals based on what they have written, they ultimately land upon a comically long-winded one. The story's final punchline may go over some younger readers' heads, but the silly dialogue in this playful tale makes for an engaging read. The minimalist illustrations, created with hand-cut foam shapes and colored digitally, do the easy-reader format justice. Observant readers will notice that the color of each animal's speech bubbles corresponds with the color of their fur, making their conversation easier to follow, and that One's, Two's, Kat's, and Four's tails each display one, two, three, and four white speckles, respectively. This winsome addition to the Elephant & Piggie Like Reading! series is bookended with commentary by co-author Willems' beloved Elephant, Piggie, and Pigeon characters.If you find yourself giggling at this goofy story, join the club. (Early reader. 4-8)

Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

The Pumphrey brothers (Somewhere in the Bayou) join this series with an all-dialogue early reader that cleverly builds on a concept while tapping into readers- passion for categorization. Foam-stamped, digitally finished illustrations, set against minimalist backgrounds, introduce four critters of varying size and color (their dialogue balloons are similarly color-coded), who each have pointy ears, long noses, saucer eyes, and bushy, spotted tails (the number of spots correspond to the order in which they-re introduced). Bright orange One is the club-s instigator, but though One can make paper hats, the animal can-t write the sign needed to announce the group-s existence. Red Two, who knows -EVERY letter- individually, makes a sign that reads a (-It is a letter AND a word-). Yellow Kat can seemingly write any three-letter word that rhymes with its name, and so makes a sign that reads -HAT.- And finally, purple-hued Four makes a sign that reads -CLUB.- So what should the crew be named? -A HAT CLUB- certainly seems logical, but One-s creativity goes someplace far funnier. Welcoming and unabashedly appreciative of each other-s talents-and new readers- needs-the critters model the kind of club that anyone would be happy to join. Ages 5-8. (May)

School Library Journal (Tue Feb 01 00:00:00 CST 2022)

K-Gr 2 Two nondescript animal characters, named One and Two, stand at tables writing "signs," which are essentially word cards. One makes paper hats for each of them and for Kat, a third character who enters the scene. The conversation continues to revolve around making more signs. The three friends are very supportive of each other and enthusiastic every time a new word is spelled out on a sign. Their caring connection is truly sweet, yet is not enough to pull readers in. Midway through the book, a fourth character named Four is introduced. Four seems to help pull the story together by spelling and writing out the word "club." Their club will be "THE PAPER-FOLDING-LETTER-WRITING-WORD-FORMING-SIGN-MAKING CLUB." Thus concludes the book, except for the last few pages when Elephant and Piggie, title characters of Mo Willems's "Elephant and Piggie Like Reading!" series that includes this book, chime in to proclaim, "Clubs are fun!" and decide to create their own club. This story doesn't quite flow. The lead characters' names are very awkward for early readers; they are clearly not phonetic reading like some of the other rhyming vocabulary words, such as hat, cat, and sat. The book contains little to no action or plot, and even the illustrations are bland and lack interest. VERDICT Pass on this one. Purchasing dollars could be better spent on more of the classic Mo Willems's "Elephant and Piggie" series titles.Linda Annable