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Summary
Summary
"Rain's gone! Time to play!" commands the queen. Well, she's not really a queen--just an ordinary girl who has an extraordinary day. She meets Mudkin, a friendly creature who whips up a robe and crown for her. Away they go to meet Her Majesty's subjects. Even if the kingdom lasts only until the next rain shower, the crown Mudkin gives her is forever.
In his unmistakable style, Caldecott-winning artist Stephen Gammell creates an ode to the most potent of childhood mixtures: mud and imagination.
Author Notes
Stephen Gammell is the winner of the Caldecott Medal for his drawings in Song and Dance Man by Karen Ackerman. His art in Where the Buffaloes Begin by Olaf Baker earned him a Caldecott Honor award, the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, and a New York Times Best Illustrated Books award.
Other books he has illustrated include Will's Mammoth by Rafe Martin, andDancing Teepees: Poems of American Indian Youth by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Sure, rain showers bring flowers, but they also bring plenty of mud-the star of Gammell's (How the Nobble Was Finally Found) exuberant picture book romp. Post-rain, a girl heads out to play, queen of her stuffed animals and all that she surveys. When a mud creature with a turnip-shaped head splashes up out of a puddle, the girl gains a new pal and a new subject who provides her with a grand robe, crown, carriage, and even a castle, all made out of the brown muck. As another thunderstorm blows in, Mudkin and his fantastic kingdom wash away-leaving only the girl's crown. In this nearly wordless volume, readers see Mudkin's communiques as splotches of mud, while the girl's speech is one side of a conversation that makes perfect sense to her. ("Hi... what's your name?" [Muddy smudges.] "Mudkin... it's nice to meet you"). Gammell's signature style-wispy, loose lines with paint splatter accents-flows freely like a muddy daydream over the spreads. No doubt that kids will be checking puddles for impish, fun-loving Mudkins of their own come spring. Ages 5-8. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Horn Book Review
An imaginative little girl goes outside to play after a rainstorm. She meets a brown, blobby creature named Mudkin, who takes her, in a mud-constructed coach, to his home and asks her to be his people's queen. Another rain shower washes the creatures--but not her memories--away. Spare text, all from the girl's side of the conversation, makes room for Gammell's trademark spattery illustrations. (c) Copyright 2011. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* There's no denying it, and little use trying to stop it. Kids love mud, and here's a picture book that positively revels in all its gleefully gloppy glory. A young girl marches out after a rainstorm with her toys, demanding a good bit of playtime. Out of the ground springs a little creature that looks kind of like a cross between an onion and, well, a friendly turd (he even has a cute little mud-butt). He introduces himself as Mudkin and asks the girl to be his queen. She's more than happy to oblige, naturally, and they're off on a sludge-filled adventure. Mudpies? Please. Try a mud carriage that carries our beaming mud queen up to a dazzlingly goopy castle where she looks out over a throng of adoring mudkins. Gammell tells the whole story with hardly any words. The girl has a few lines of dialogue, but Mudkin's responses are all a scrawl of indecipherable brown smears, offering a neat chance for kids to engage and fill in their own ideas for what he's saying. But what will really bring on the squeals is the joyfully messy watercolors that look composed of thick, overhand tosses of mud splatters and heartily ground-in grass stains. Just about the perfect book to cozy up to and relive fond memories of pre-bathtime muckfests.--Chipman, Ian Copyright 2010 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 1-Mud holds a natural attraction for children it seems, and Gammell imaginatively plays off that premise with pages full of swirls and drips of brownish colors set against grays and blues of showery skies. As the story begins, a young unnamed heroine commandeers her stuffed animal playmates to come outside for a post-rainstorm romp. Before long, a splotch of mud catapults skyward, announcing the arrival of Mudkin, a brown, babylike creature whose head resembles a Hershey's chocolate kiss. Naming the child his Queen, Mudkin invites her to play; soon she, too, is reveling in the wet dirt, wearing a mud cape and a crownlike pointy hat. What a day they have-complete with a carriage ride to a castle (mud-built, of course) and a welcome by a bevy of little Mudkins. When the returning rain washes Mudkin and her earthy costume away, the youngster gathers up her toy friends, the left-behind hat, and, with happy memories of a magical day, heads home. For Mudkin's few phrases, Gammell cleverly places mud splats for dialogue, nudging children into supplying their own interpretations. There's little text; the artist's energetic style and rain-splashed colors carry the story forward.-Barbara Elleman, Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, Amherst, MA (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Garibaldi's Biscuits, 2009, etc.), with its blotchy watercolors and masterful control of the legibility of the wash within messy shapes. However, the story itself is muddy and mired in a lack of clarity. In its essence, it's a wordless tale that would have been better served by remaining so. The beauty of Gammell's meticulously hand-lettered text and the integration of Mudkin's "language" requires better narrative execution than it receives here. While clearly extra care was put into the production of this title, from the metallic highlights on the cover to the brilliantly illustrated mud, the end result is unfortunately drowned in detail. (Picture book. 5-8)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
