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  • How to Promenade with a Python (and Not Get Eaten) by Rachel Poliquin
  • Elizabeth Bush

Poliquin, Rachel How to Promenade with a Python (and Not Get Eaten); illus. by Kathryn Durst. Tundra, 2021 [84p] (Polite Predators) Trade ed. ISBN 9780735266582 $12.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9780735266599 $7.99 Reviewed from digital galleys R 5-8 yrs

Celeste, an elegant Madagascar hissing cockroach who's been around the block a time or two, serves as guide for any hypothetical kid who might be wooed by sweet-talking lethal wildlife—in this case, Frank, a reticulated python who has invited said hypothetical kid out for a hypothetical moonlight stroll. To navigate this social challenge one must first become acquainted with the python, so as to take proper precautions. Celeste thus introduces the real point of this nonfiction outing—information about pythons, especially avoiding death by python. Though the promenade device is sometimes awkward, information is straightforward and surprisingly sophisticated, given the loony premise, and its encapsulation is often pretty hilarious, as when Celeste sacrifices Mr. Jingles, a stuffed banana jester, to demonstrate how a python swallows its prey—even kid-sized prey. Durst's digitally finished crayon pencil pictures are appropriately lively and goofy, and her naïve anatomical graphs are equally comical and effective. Try this at storytime, when it's likely to please both the snake-lovers and snake-haters in the group.

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