Mouse Letters: A Very First Alphabet Book

by Jim Arnosky

Young children can follow along as a young, productive mouse creates the entire alphabet out of sticks, but the sticks have a penchant for collapsing, rolling, and falling, in a hilarious introduction to the alphabet.

Genres: Picture Books

48 pages, Hardcover

First published March 22, 1999

About the author

Jim Arnosky was born in New York City, NY Sept 1, 1946. He was raised in Pennsylvania. Jim graduated from high school in Philadelphia and joined the US Naval Reserves. His active duty took him to Maryland and Bremerhaven, Germany.

In 1976 Jim and his wife Deanna moved to Vermont with their two daughters where they have lived in an old farmhouse for the past 28 years. 17 of those years were spent raising sheep.

Jim is self taught in writing, art and the natural sciences. He has written and illustrated 86 books on nature subjects and has illustrated 46 other books written by various authors. He has been awarded the Christopher Medal, Orbis Pictus Honor, ALA Gordon Award, and Outstanding Science book awards from National Science Teachers Associations.

Jim loves to fish, boat, and play his guitar. In his work, he uses a Betacam SP video camcorder with a 1600 mm lens to record the wildlife he and Deanna find all across the country.

Reviews

[R. C. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jasper, 4 and still learning his letters, loves to browse through this wordless book and tell from the sweetly drawn illustrations the ridiculous story of a clearly emotional mouse having quite the adventure with several sticks and a steep hillside. In the course of conquering the sticks, the mouse makes every letter of the alphabet, in order. The little mouse is a pretty lovable guy. I personally love Jim Arnosky for blessing my son's childhood with this very best alphabet book. A word on the subtitle though: it's not that great as a first alphabet book for infants or toddlers. Kids have to know some letters to catch on, and preschoolers are the right age to get a thrill from realizing there's a second layer to this tale.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

22 months - because it's a wordless book the adult is forced to be creative to "read" it with their child. You actually really enjoyed this one. I would describe what the mouse was doing with the sticks (bending them etc) and you would announce what letter he had made. There was always concern when the mouse bumps his head and needs an ice pack.

[Mckinley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Charming

[Cmfzebra · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like when the mouse bumps his head.