Reviews of Chicken Butt!
Kirkus Reviews
An unhinged piece of slap-happy rhyming...rocket-propelled artwork...the romp is a powerful piece of cacophony, more frenetic by the moment.
School Library Journal
by Susan E. Murray
On the prefatory pages, a boy meets a chicken while at a newsstand with his father, and it follows him home. Once they are all settled on the couch, the chicken prompts the infamous rhyming conversation between father and son. “‘You know what?’ ‘What?’ ‘Chicken butt.’ ‘You know why?’ ‘Why?’ ‘Chicken thigh!’” And so it goes. The plot is simple – the conversation escalates until the exasperated father says, “Enough! No more!” But the child continues, giving the story a new twist. Cole’s illustrations and the page design work to make this book really enjoyable. The dialogue is written in different fonts – the father’s in black in an authoritative typewriter font and the son’s in bold red. The father, reading his newspaper, wants nothing more than some peace, while the boy cavorts with the pop-eyed chicken. The illustrations are manic and raucous, and the humor is evident throughout. This book would be fun to read aloud with children in two voices or act out at storytimes and in classrooms. Kids will definitely love it.