Duck & Penguin Are NOT Friends
by Julia Woolf
Date: 2019
Publisher: Peachtree Publishing Company
Reading level: C
Book type: picture book
Pages: 32
Format: e-book
Source: NetGalley
Betty and Maud are the best of friends, and so surely their stuffed toys are too! But despite what Betty and Maud might think, Duck and Penguin are definitely NOT friends. They do not want to swing together, they do not want to cook together, and they certainly DO NOT want to play baby dolls together...
A side-splitting insight into the secret world of toys, from former Dreamworks animator and illustrator Julia Woolf.
(synopsis from Goodreads)
I feel like I missed something here. Duck and Penguin go from not wanting to do anything together (and, in fact, they're shown physically abusing each other on the beginning endpapers) to being friends. Because... they have a shared disdain for playing with their human owners? I guess maybe a shared hatred for playing "itty-bitty babies" may have brought them together, but it's kind of a thin premise to hang the whole story on.
The illustrations don't really do anything for me, either (but the dismal quality of the ARC didn't help; I could barely see what I was looking at through all the pixelation).
I didn't find this as "side-splitting" as the synopsis suggests. Mostly, I was bored. And looking at the surly expressions on the toys' faces got old pretty fast.
Thank you to NetGalley and Peachtree Publishing Company for providing a digital ARC.
Premise: 2/5
Meter: n/a
Writing: 3/5
Illustrations: 3/5
Originality: 2/5
Enjoyment: 1/5
Overall: 2 out of 5
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