Potato Joe

Starred review from June 16, 2008
This book gets sillier and sillier without ever forsaking its low-key cool, and that's no small potatoes. Readers may think they're in for a rehash of the classic counting rhyme “One potato, two potato, three potato four.” But Potato Joe and his fellow spuds quickly prove that theirs is no meat-and-potatoes affair; in fact, if it can rhyme with potato, they're all over it: playing tic-tac-toe, spotting a big black crow, holding a rodeo, flirting with saucy Tomato Flo. Baker (Big Fat Hen
) doesn't give himself much to work with: his characters are essentially a collection of velvety brown ovals with the simplest of faces, and all the action takes place on a strip of dirt and is framed straight on (readers are asked to tilt the book sideways when the potatoes create a towering pile-up). But only someone with cold sour cream running through his veins could resist turning the page to see what rhyme and activity are served up next. Ages 3–7.

June 1, 2008
PreS-Gr 1-This picture book is based on the familiar nursery rhyme, "One Potato, Two Potato." One by one, 10 potatoes pop out of the ground to experience silly, unrelated things: a big black crow flying over them, being covered in snow, a rodeo. Two fruits, Tomato Flo and Watermelon Moe, join the fun briefly before the potatoes roll back to the garden and "Tally-ho!" into the ground. The fuzzy-edged, childlike illustrations were done in Adobe Photoshop and complement the bouncy tone of the text. This will be fun to share, and even young children will soon have the rhyme committed to memory."Lee Bock, Glenbrook Elementary School, Pulaski, WI"

Copyright 2008 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2008
The vaunted tuberous root vegetable gets its due in this illustrated salute. Using the classic children's rhyme "One potato, two potato" as his springboard, layered with an improvisational rhythm, Baker incorporates other words that rhyme with potato ("tic-tac-toe," "big black crow"). The wonderfully cheeky spreads feature ten smiling potatoes bopping in the dirt, with cameos by fellow garden-grown friends.

(Copyright 2008 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)