The Chicken-Chasing Queen of Lamar County (review)

The mischief sings in every syllable of this energetic tale of a girl who just can't stop chasing the chickens on her grandmother's farm. Her routine is as regimented as a soldier's: first she gets up and performs morning ablutions, then she eats breakfast, tells her grandmother a few stories, and commences her chicken chasing. Of course she has her nemesis, the one chicken in the yard that is as smart, wily, and quick as the chicken-chaser herself. When she stealthily tracks Miss Hen to her hiding place, though, she discovers a true treasure—Miss Hen is a mama, and this changes everything. From then on, the chicken chaser becomes the chicken tender, feeding and minding the birds with no less energy but with far more loving care. Harrington's storytelling style makes the prose jump from page to ear, with lots of onomatopoeic wordsmithery tucked in to showcase the girl's affinity for her feathery playmates; the prucks, pee-os, and sqwaukKKs will exercise the reader's vocal skills and delight young listeners. Jackson's kinetic collage and paint art is more than a match for Harrington's lively language; the chickens are improbably composed of feathers made from notebook and graph paper, stamps, homespun fabrics, chair caning, lace, title lists, and painted paper with finely inked designs. These collage bits stand out against the textured painting of the backgrounds and the face of our heroine, whose expressions mirror those of her two chief adversaries—her grandmother and Miss Hen—in two particularly humorous spreads, rendering palpable the contest of wills. Other spreads highlight the peculiar grace of the prepubescent girl enjoying her dubious avocation. Readers will join with her in enjoying fully the pleasures of the thrill of the chase and the surprising satisfaction of getting something wholly different from what you expected.