The Lion and the Mouse by Jenny Broom (review)

This adaptation of Aesop’s tale gets new life from a slight change in the original storyline and clever paper engineering. Here, when a little mouse attempts to scamper up the sleeping lion’s back to reach some tasty berries, the awakened lion assists the mouse in obtaining the fruit; the mouse promises a favor in return and scampers off. That night, hunters come to the forest and lay a trap for the mighty lion; fortunately, the mouse is true to her word and chews through the net, releasing her new friend. The altered story makes for a far more compassionate lion, who never threatens to eat the mouse and in fact empathizes with her (“I know what it feels like to be hungry”). The real draw, though, is the art, wherein die-cut holes redeploy illustrative elements (the spot on a butterfly’s wing is later revealed to be the lion’s eye) and a pierced partial-page flap constitutes the net and allows little hands to play the role of liberator by lifting the page. The digitally rendered images have a collage-like joy in texture and planes of color to enliven their graphic simplicity, and the geometric stylings of the images themselves (the mouse’s perfectly triangular face, the lion’s boxy jaw) are well designed. The brilliant shades of turquoise, teal, magenta, and tangerine, as well as the book’s large, square trim size, will carry well in a storytime format. This is a strong addition to the fables shelf that will provide plenty of visual and tactile stimulation for young viewers.