Product Description

Wendell and Floyd become convinced that the shortcut over the fence will get them to school on time, but instead they begin a wild race through the jungle, trying to elude the crocodiles and avoid the quicksand.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #26546 in Books
• Published on: 1999-09-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 32 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780439110914
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From Publishers Weekly
Teague's skewed sense of humor is unleashed once again in this droll tale of two fellows having trouble getting to school on time. Wendell and Floyd's excuses sound perfectly plausible to them?alien invasions, pirates in the neighborhood, a plague of frogs?but their teacher, Ms. Gernsblatt, is having none of it and issues an ultimatum. Determined to be punctual, they leave at the crack of dawn and take a shortcut. Alas, suburban backyards quickly give way to jungle, and the boys are in for the adventure of their lives. Like William Joyce, Teague (Pigsty; The Iguana Brothers) has a knack for visualizing that privileged realm of childhood where imagination and reality collide, and for sending it up through broad exaggeration. His color-saturated acrylics, verging on the satirical, aim straight for the funnybone (Wendell and Floyd picking their way through the plague of frogs, for instance). The combination of deadpan text and unbridled art is a sure-fire recipe for a crowd-pleaser. Ages 5-up.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal
Kindergarten-Grade 2-Teague, the author/illustrator of Pigsty (1994) and Moog-Moog Space Barber (1991, both Scholastic) has concocted yet another outrageous flight of fancy. In this adventure, try as they might, Wendell and Floyd cannot seem to make it to school on time. First they are captured by space creatures; then they encounter pirates and a plague of frogs. Finally, they try a shortcut, only to be distracted by quicksand swamps and sleeping crocodiles. While the conclusion lacks the punch promised by the build-up, children will identify with the daily struggle and will be entertained by the artist's dizzying perspectives and swirling brush strokes. His decorative sense and ability to create backgrounds and foregrounds that pulse with motion make this a promising candidate for a back-to-school story time on excuses-pair it with appropriate Shel Silverstein poems. Teachers will appreciate the boys' interracial friendship; children will enjoy the silly situations.
Wendy Lukehart, Dauphin County Library, Harrisburg, PA
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Ages 4^-8. Wendell and Floyd just can't seem to get to school on time. Of course it's never their fault: on Monday, they're delayed by space aliens, on Tuesday, by pirates, and on Wednesday, by a plague of frogs. Unfortunately, their teacher doesn't buy their excuses. Given one last chance, Wendell suggests a secret shortcut. But the "shortcut" leads to the wildest adventure of all, as the boys enter a jungle with swamps, crocodiles, and swinging vines. The boisterous fun of the story is matched by the exuberant acrylic illustrations. Exaggerated images in lush jungle colors swirl across the page. School kids will chortle as the boys dash to beat the bell. Leone McDermott

Customer Reviews

Not Wild Enough
Wendell and Floyd just can't seem to get to school on time. They offer completely outlandish excuses for being late to school (pirates, a plague of frogs!), but realize that they need to find a way to get there on time. Wendell (who, perhaps in homage to early comics, looks very much like one of the Katzenjammer kids of 1897) has an idea: He and Floyd will take "the secretest shortcut of them all...In fact, I invented it myself."

After scrambling though a thicket of vines, Wendell and Floyd find that their shortcut leads to a jungle! Two-page color spread shows the boys maneuvering past leopards, peacocks, and tapirs, rhinos, and snake; traveling a narrow path across "quicksand swamps and sleeping crocodiles," and then over a "deep, rocky gorge." Seeing that the shortcut is taking as long, if not longer, than the "longcut," the boys swing Tarzan-like from vines until the vines run out and they land in a muddy lake.

Although the wild diversion through the jungle is humorous and sometimes exciting, the book is a bit one-dimensional: They're traveling through a jungle, it's true, but they see typical jungle creatures and terrain. Some of the illustrations lacked depth because of insufficient shadowing, although I like the multiple perspectives from which Teague draws the boys. The conclusion, which comes quickly, is also a bit disappointing.

The book might have been more compelling if the boys had encountered as much of the improbable on the shortcut as they did on their usual route (for example, the plague of frogs). The monkey-mimicking vine swinging, ending with the disgruntled boys "in a giant puddle of mud" is a nice surprise, but a more ridiculous progression of events, perhaps told straight a la Daniel Pinkwater would have been funnier and more interesting.

What an imagination!
This is a fun book to read aloud to young children. They will enjoy both the story and the illustrations. Working in a school library I have learned that children are motivated to read by the pictures. This will be a popular book in our school library!

Wonderful Pictures
I buy all of Teague's books due to the WONDERFUL pictures! The children in my church are spellbound when I read them at Children's time. The pictures go from edge to edge of each page causing much wide eyed wonder on the part of both adult and children alike!

This one is a very cute tale of imagination.