Hugh Pine and Something Else

From the creators of Hugh Pine and Hugh Pine and the Good Place comes another fond story about that curmudgeonly, upright-walking porcupine. When Hugh's friend Mr. McTosh describes his vacation as ``Something Else,'' (meaning something other than the dull, daily routines of non-vacation time), the porcupine decides that he, too, needs one. So he travels to New York City to stay with Mr. McTosh's sister (who keeps calling Hugh ``nephew''), meeting the household pets, Fong and Nya, and a neighborhood bulldog appropriately named Bully. Hugh, Mr. McTosh and readers will be equally relieved to get back to the Maine woods . In this book, Hugh's wisdom lacks a little of the pungency on which his reputation is based. However, there are singular delights among the pages, not the least of which is Hugh's succinct clobbering of the Pekingese, Fong. Ages 8-up. (Sept.)