One Frog Too Many

One Frog Too Many
Mercer and Marianna Mayer~ Dial, 1975

Often considered one of the first illustrators to use the wordless picture book format, this book was the last in Mercer's famous frog series that started with his first published book ever, A Boy, a Dog and a Frog. I am reviewing this one in particular, because by the time it was published in 1975, Mercer's signature look had taken hold, and all of the characters are way more stylized and complete than in the first book. Plus, it is hilarious... these two pictures ~ both of the one frog jealously torturing the other ~ are worth the admission price alone. The whole series, in fact (A Boy... '67, Frog, Where Are You? '69, A Boy, a Dog, a Frog, and a Friend '71, Frog on His Own '73, Frog Goes to Dinner '74), rocks my world pretty hard, and no child's library is complete without it.

As it pretty obvious in the pictures, when the boy gets gifted a new baby frog, his older frog buddy gets miffed and spends the entire book trying to sobotage his cuter, younger counterpart. Man, I can't get enough of that adorable sour puss, sooooo older sibling for sure!

I don't know about your public library, but ours has a "small books" section where you can find these guys and Beatrix Potter and Lois Lenski and others, and we always end up there with the wee little titles spilling out on the floor, laughing our butts off and having the best time. Mercer's frog books might be the single most important reason why I love having a boy. That and Miley Cyrus... (insert full body shiver here.)

Also by:
Liza Lou and the Yeller Belly Swamp
One Monster After Another
Professor Wormbog in Search for the Zipperump-A-Zoo
Me and My Flying Machine
A Special Trick
Oops
Little Monster at Work
Bubble Bubble
How the Trollusk Got His Hat
Beauty and the Beast