My+Friend+Rabbit

2003 Caldecott Medal Winner
Rohmann, E. (2002). //My friend rabbit.// New York, NY: Square Fish.


 * Summary:** Rabbit and Mouse are friends, but no matter what Rabbit does, he gets himself into trouble. Mouse gets a new airplane and when Rabbit plays with it, the plane ends up in a tree. Naturally Rabbit tries to help and comes up with an elaborate plan to get the plane back.


 * Grade Level:** PS-1
 * Reading Level:** 2.3


 * Curriculum Connections:** //My Friend Rabbit// would be a great text to use for character education and teaching students the importance of forgiving others. Mouse is extremely understanding of Rabbit and knows that he truly means well.

My friend Rabbit means well, begins the mouse narrator. But whatever he does, wherever he goes, trouble follows. Once Rabbit pitches Mouse's airplane into a tree, Rohmann tells most of the story through bold, expressive relief prints, a dramatic departure for the illustrator of The Cinder-Eyed Cats and other more painterly works. Rabbit might be a little too impulsive, but he has big ideas and plenty of energy. Rohmann pictures the pint-size, long-eared fellow recruiting an elephant, a rhinoceros and other large animals, and coaching them to stand one on top of another, like living building blocks, in order to retrieve Mouse's plane. Readers must tilt the book vertically to view the climactic spread: a tall, narrow portrait of a stack of very annoyed animals sitting on each other's backs as Rabbit holds Squirrel up toward the stuck airplane. The next spread anticipates trouble, as four duckling onlookers scurry frantically; the following scene shows the living ladder upended, with lots of flying feathers and scrabbling limbs. Somehow, in the tumult, the airplane comes free, and Mouse, aloft again, forgives his friend... even as the closing spread implies more trouble to follow. This gentle lesson in patience and loyalty, balanced on the back of a hilarious set of illustrations, will leave young readers clamoring for repeat readings
 * Publisher's Weekly Review 2002: (from Mackin)**