After a whiff of success as the illustrator of Walter the Farting Dog, Colman goes it alone in this disappointing dog story. Francine is a charcoal gray mutt with spindly legs, a thick torso and strange human eyes. She bemoans her drab life "with the boring, persnickety Crabapple clan," a frowning family with bloated bodies and a greenish cast to their skin. "Sometimes they acted as though I weren't there./ They'd chat right above me. 'Twas quite hard to bear," Francine complains. She clamors for attention by roller-skating, wearing sunglasses and stealing a baby's diaper, but only gets scolded. At last, in a " 'Twas the Night Before Christmas" moment (the contraction " 'twas" appears three times), Francine makes her getaway: "Straight out of the window I jumped in a flash/ without my umbrella or even some cash." She wanders to the studio of a troupe called the Dancing Fools, and they gladly adopt her. In the concluding images, Francine shakes a tambourine in a conga line and goes to the title beach party, where the Crabapples inexplicably appear. Colman's monotonous couplets, including the pairing of "Prague" with "dog," leave much to be desired. Her asymmetrical compositions feature lurid, airbrushed colors and jumbled patterns reminiscent of Pee-wee Herman. Colman plays to Walter
fans with a reference to "dog poo" and a pictured brown swirl of doggy doo on a lawn, but Francine lacks Walter's je ne sais quoi. Ages 4-8. (June)
