I Lost My Tooth! by Mo Willems (review)

Teachers, parents, and new readers ready to level up after the Elephant and Piggie series: rejoice! Willems has launched a new series in the style of a variety show, combining a fictional story with an informational resource while directing a few nods to understanding new media forms. The active cast features sixteen main characters, all identified as squirrels (though one—Flappy Squirrel—is really a bird, and a couple lack squirrel tails so their true species is unclear), plus a pair of acorn comedians, a few quiz show guests, and seven "emote-acorns" who appear on pages "when the Squirrels have BIG feelings." Following a comic story wherein Zoom Squirrel loses his front tooth and the other squirrels set out to find it, Research Rodent takes over to answer Boom Squirrel's questions about what teeth are made of, and a quiz show offers more facts in an interactive format. Each section is distinguished by a different harvest-colored border to help young readers distinguish between genres, and Willems continues his practice of using speech bubbles and indicating page turns, though these seem unnecessary at this level of literacy development. There are some missteps, especially in the missed opportunity to explain why and when baby teeth fall out in the first place, but new readers will nonetheless respond to Willems' signature antic humor while being slyly introduced to the differences and connections between fiction and nonfiction. KC