Rolie Polie Olie
Any book that features robots dancing around in their underpants is a book worth owning. William Joyce--creator ofDinosaur BobandGeorge Shrinks--brings his expansive, wildly colored illustrations to the story of a cute, buglike robot and his family. Rolie Polie Olie lives on a faraway planet with his mom and pop, his sister Zowie, and his doggie Spot. They spend a pretty ordinary day playing, working, eating, and getting ready for bed in this delightfully modest tale of robotic family happiness. Joyce's bouncy prose is engaging enough to be read aloud time and again: "You're Rolie hot and Polie tired. Your motor's zapped. Your piston's fired. Yes, okey dokey is the day when all you Rolie did was play." The illustrations are vintage Joyce, with a 1930s deco look that's polished without being soulless. The pictorial lushness is a nice counterpoint to the simplicity of the tale, which devotes a grand full-page spread to the little-known fact that "The Rolie Polie Rumba Dance was always done in underpants!"--Claire Dederer