Fast Cheetah, Slow Tortoise: Poems of Animal Opposites
by Bette Westera; illus. by Mies van Hout; trans. from Dutch by David Colmer
Primary    Eerdmans    40 pp.
9/24    9780802856357    $18.99
e-book ed.  9781467468657    $18.99

This quirky, inviting picture book–length poetry collection acts as a visual dictionary of opposites. Sixteen pairs of animals are presented on double-page spreads as exemplars of various contrasting qualities: tidy versus messy, playful versus dignified, and so on. An assortment of creatures is depicted, beginning with the titular slow tortoise and fast cheetah and continuing on to pairings such as an obedient sheep and a rebellious goat. A free-verse poem highlights the focused-on characteristic of each animal in contrast with the other. The poems are short, pithy, and colloquial, told in the first person. For example, from the “quiet” pill bug: “We don’t scratch, / we don’t crunch, / we don’t hum, / we don’t buzz. // We sit under a rock, / and if we come out, / we sneak.” The stylized illustrations pop, with a vivid color palette and texture reminiscent of Eric Carle. The spreads are varied and cleverly designed, with the animal pairs sometimes interacting (dolphin and sperm whale), or merely facing each other (snake and earthworm), or eyeing each other suspiciously (spider and blowfly). The combination of bold, dynamic art and lively first-person poems makes this a great choice to read aloud and dramatize with young readers or listeners.

From the ">November/December 2024 issue of The Horn Book Magazine.