Stuart Hides Out (I Can Read Book)
PreSchool-Grade 2-These two beginning readers are based on incidents  from the movie Stuart Little, which took its name from the book,  but basically that's all. In one story, the little mouse climbs  into a vase while hiding from a cat, but then needs the help of  the feline to get free. In the second book, Stuart has an  adventure with a large fish and a turtle while piloting a toy  boat across a park lake. Both are in an accessible, easy-reader  format with large type and colorful pictures based on the movie,  but they are a poor relation to E. B. White's famous Stuart  Little (HarperCollins, 1945). Neither "adventure" is from the  original book, so why steal the stars? It is blatant  commercialism to take a famous character and a few familiar  details (the names of the boat and the cat) and put them in  watered-down scenarios. These offerings are a disservice to  children's literature and to its readers.Nancy A. Gifford,  Schenectady County Public Library, NYCopyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.