Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Forest Hotel: A Counting Book

FOREST HOTEL A COUNTING STORY
Barbara Steincrohn Davis with illustrations by Benvenuti/ published 1972 by Golden Books


I'm always intrigued by artists who only use one name, so I dug a deeper to find out a little something about the illustrator. Apparently Gianni Benvenuti was an Italian painter and sculptor who was able to make a living illustrating books including Italian editions of Winnie the Pooh. This little book has an interesting style using very design heavy lines. I love the way he draw bubbles and leaves. And the Hippo from page two is fabulous!

The door opened, and in clumped ONE huge hippopotamus.
"I'd like a place for ONE, please," said the hippopotamus
to the rabbit behind the desk.
"Somewhere a fella can really roll around."


It goes on like this through the numbers. Animals (by number) show up, and a friendly little rabbit shows them to their appropriate places in the forest for the night (with the rabbit always hippety-hopping back to his office). Really fun story!

3 comments:

Esme Raji Codell said...

Hi, Scribbler! You have been earned a "Lion" award from the Shameless Lions Writing Club. Details and links at www.planetesme.blogspot.com.
Congratulations, and great job! Thanks for all you do.

Michelle said...

This was my favourite book as a child. My entire extended family had it memorized. We read the book so often it fell apart. I look for it whenever I see a Golden Book display, but sadly it doesn't seem to be in print anymore.

Unknown said...

My mom found one for me on ebay from Canada. You might try that route. She also ordered Rags for me.

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