I've fallen for Dev Petty and Mike Boldt again. I Don't Want to be a Frog reunites us with our spunky frog friend and his glasses-wearing dad as he continually asserts that he'd rather be anything except a frog. Once again, the humor and illustrations pair together perfectly to tell a fantastic little story about an adolescent amphibian that doesn't feel overly satisfied with his lot in life. (Frogs have to eat bugs after all. Yuck!) Get ready for the end because it's sure to cause howls of laughter with the little people in your life as you read it out loud to them. I could go on and on about how much fun I think this book is but I have to get back to reading. :-P
PS This is definitely one for storytime.
I didn't mean for this to happen but somehow I ended up running across another picture book that prominently features a frog. This one is I Don't Want to be Big by Dev Petty with illustrations by Mike Boldt and much like Frog on a Log? it's part of a series. It was the artistic style which originally drew me to this book but it's the humor that had me taking it along to storytime. This is a fantastic book to read to kids since it deals with that all-important topic: 'growing up'. Our main character is adamant that growing up is the absolute worst and he is determined that he's not going to do it. His father (an adorable frog wearing glasses) tries to convince him of the merits (all in the name of eating his dinner I might add) but the little frog has some pretty convincing arguments. I'd say my one niggling criticism is the way that the speech bubbles tend to overlap on the page which can make it a bit confusing at times (especially when you're doing different character voices). Other than that, it's a solid readaloud book that I highly recommend. 9/10
Source: Amazon