Cool Daddy Rat

Debut author Crow’s hip ode to jazz (and scat in particular) will sweep up its audience in its catchy beat as kinetic cartoon art adds verve and wit. Blue-gray rats with bulbous snouts and ever-expressive eyes star in the animals-only tale. Bass player Cool Daddy Rat, in his rose-colored jacket and black beret, heads out to perform in the big city, but his son, Ace, stows away: Daddy Rat “got to scat for a fat cat/ witty kitty shoo bat/ went an odd way/ down Broadway/ hippy zippy/ zee zat/ and found Ace in his bass case!/ peeky squeaky who dat.” After being made to phone his mother (Ace’s rats-will-be-rats expression is alone worth the cover price), the little rat tags along to the various gigs, among them a rooftop party and a cruise. Lester’s (A Is for Salad ) computer-assisted watercolor illustrations in a heady palette show characters seemingly in perpetual motion—jumping, dancing, moving ahead in the line outside a club. (Ignore the cover image, which seems defaced by the lettering for the title.) The undercurrent of scat, always printed in a colored font, will be read-aloud heaven for jazz-loving adults, giving kids an addictive first taste of the pleasures to be had. Ages 3-up. (Mar.)