On a windy day, fancy red underpants are blown off a clothesline and onto a rabbit's head. "What's this?" he wonders. "It's a hat!" he declares. "No, that's wrong. It's not a hat." the text notes. A procession of other animals appears across the pages, each trying the "hat" on with hilarious results, exclaiming how "wonderful" or "fabulous" or "magnificent" it is. The rabbit is skeptical, while the text keeps reminding us that it is not a hat. Finally, a nattily clad donkey brings a touch of reality with his insistence, "It's not a hat. They're underpants." But rabbit finds that his tail won't fit in the "pants." And the other animals disagree. Finally, rabbit concludes, "It's a wonderful hat!" The front-end pages show a deserted worktable and a clothesline with clothes, but no underpants. The first double-page spread shows the clothes on the line whipped by the wind as it carries off the underpants. There is little need for more than the very brief text and the amusing, sketchy illustrations to tell the story. The cast of animals, naturalistically-drawn but anthropomorphic in behavior, are sure to produce laughs. The final end-pages, which show each of them wearing a piece of the garments from the front, ends the fun. Age: 4 to 8
By Zhaohua Ji & Cui Xu, Hardcover, 32 Pages, 8" x 11.15"
