ChildrensPictureBook.info Review

Elephant on My Roof
By Erin Harris
Publisher Red Cygnet Press

Lani has a problem. There’s an elephant on his roof. Deciding that catching the elephant is not the perfect solution to the problem of getting the elephant down, Lani seeks the help of his fellow villagers. Reluctant to help and opposed to having an elephant messing up the village, the villagers finally acquiesce and agree to help. Using a boat and some rope the elephant is hauled down to safety and then proves that it really is a good thing to help an elephant. Lani and the elephant devise clever ways, which only an elephant can manage to help each of the skeptical villagers in turn. The villager’s respond by throwing a surprise party to celebrate their newfound friend, the elephant. Erin Harris’s watercolor illustrations are the heart of this picture book. You can tell the story, as I’ve just briefly done, but you haven’t really read the story until you’ve “read” the illustrations. Harris has created a folk tale quality to this larger twist on Aesop’s The Lion and the Mouse.

Elephant on My Roof

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