The Queen of Frogs
by Davide Cali with illustrations by Marco Soma
Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, 2017
If you have seen the popular South African movie,
The Gods Must Be Crazy
(1980, 20th Century Fox), then you will understand the premise of this
delightfully illustrated cautionary tale of a colony of frogs who
suddenly discover a crown. If you have not, I will suggest that queen in
question has the desire and ambition of "Yertle the Turtle" (from
Yertle the Turtle and Other Stories) and the
clueless bravado of the infamous emperor in "The Emperor's New Clothes."
Turnabout is fair play is exhibited in the book's humorous ending with a twist.
The
illustrations appear to be a combination of pencil sketches painted with
the muted earth tones of a frog bog. The anthropomorphic frogs cavort
with great expression. Humorous details include frogs fishing with
spools of thread for reels and a Venus Flytraps as bait. The frogs fish
up, of course, as the target catch are flies! A bottle cap can also be
spotted as the official seal on the the royal spokesman's podium.
The
Queen of Frogs was first published in Portugal. My copy was courtesy of
LibraryThing's Early Reviewers Program. I highly recommend it as a
read-aloud for older listeners or a read alone for elementary school
students.
