Through the Looking Glass Children's Book Reviews
Once I Heard a Little Wombat
Board Book
For infants to children age 4
Random House Australia, 2016 ISBN: 978-0857987396
When you travel to different countries, you find that they all have their own collection of beloved nursery rhymes that grownups sing or recite to their little ones. Often these nursery rhymes incorporate plants, animals, cultural traditions and other elements that are specific to that country or area. Thus in Africa tales and songs might mention elephants and cheetahs. In India children hear about monkeys, great rivers and high mountains.
In this book, Renee Treml has created a nursery rhyme like tale that takes us to Australia where we meet six different kinds of animals. The narrator is looking for an animal to be its friend and it asks each animal it encounters if it will “stay, stay, stay” or “stop, stop, stop.” Unfortunately, for the lonely narrator, the sugar glider flies away, the bilbly hops away, the Tasmanian devil walks off, and the duckbilled platypus dives deep into the water with a “plop, plop, plop.” It is only when a wombat comes up with a “stomp, stomp, stomp,” that the narrator finally finds someone who is willing to “stay, stay, stay” to “play, play, play.”
Full of wonderful illustrations and a bouncy rhyming text that is full of action and sound words, this wonderful little story will delight young children. They will be tickled when they discover who the narrator of the story is.
