Curious George Learns to Count from 1 to 100: 04/12/12

Five years ago I wrote a rather snarky review of Curious George and the Hot Air Balloon by H.A. Rey. Most of my snark was directed towards the use of the dead author's name. At the time I had no plans on going back to school, nor dreams of being a librarian.

That has since changed and with it my feelings on ghost written books such as the latest Curious George books. There are two kinds of authors: single authors, people who can be pinpointed to a birth, a death and a specific number of books. Then there are corporate entities. These authors could be pseudonyms, ghost written books (such as the new Curious George books) or books by groups or actual corporations.

The other thing I've come to appreciate as a library student is the importance of helping readers find books. A person needs to know how many books by an author a library has. For children or parents who want to find Curious George books are going to look for H. A. Rey books. Why complicate things by having a new author especially since the original author is dead?

So that brings me to my review of Curious George Learns to Count from 1 to 100. Harriet picked out the book when she was learning her numbers from 1 to 100 in preschool. She was also reading through the original Curious George at the time so this book had a natural appeal to her.

For a beginning counting book, it's long, complicated and intricate — in good ways. More than anything it reminds me of Richard Scarry's Busy Town books in its scope and its execution. Just as I would spend hours pouring over a Richard Scarry volume as a child, so did Harriet with Curious George Learns to Count from 1 to 100.

Not only did Harriet love it, her brother did too. He had fun reading the book both to himself and with his sister.

Five stars.

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