Rex

Description

From the inimitable Simon James, a heartwarming story about a surprising dinosaur adoptive dad.

Once upon about 65 million years ago, a terrifying tyrannosaurus roams the earth. He spends his days raging through the jungle, scaring every other dinosaur in sight with his fierce roar. Then, one night while he is sleeping, an abandoned egg cracks open and out pops a tiny dinosaur who decides right then and there that this scary tyrannosaurus is his father. And so begins the touching story of a little dino and his search for a dad—a tale sure to resonate with families of all stripes.Single parenting, T. Rex style…in splashy, melodramatic cartoon scenes featuring a variety of wide-eyed dinosaurs against a backdrop of erupting volcanoes, James exaggerates the size differential between the two rexes to comical effect, endows Little Rex with a cute overbite, and closes with shared smiles. A cozy bit of new-family making…
—Kirkus Reviews

This warm father-and-son adventure has an exciting plot and features cameos by all kinds of dinosaurs with big personalities; with young Rex painted a bright spring green to hold the focus, the amusing, expressive pastel-hued illustrations done in watercolor and ink keep all the aggressive action light and nonthreatening.
—The Horn Book

James’s loose watercolor-and-ink illustrations comically highlight the contrast between the dinosaurs’ sizes and personalities, especially in scenes that show Rex trying to keep up with his adoptive father’s tree-uprooting, boulder-smashing, and dino-scaring. Rex’s night alone in the woods is just scary enough (even herbivores have menacing teeth in James’s world), and the tender closing reunion puts to rest any question of who Rex’s father really is.
—Publishers Weekly

James’ humorous watercolor illustrations capture the pair’s activities…Pair this sweet father-son story with Ryan T. Higgins’ Mother Bruce (2015) for another amusing take on unconventional families.
—Booklist

A winsome orphan finds an adoptive Cretaceous dad in “Rex” (Candlewick, 40 pages, $16.99), a picture book by Simon James…In Mr. James’s humorous illustrations, with scratchy black lines and jubilant splashes of watercolor, we see the monster roaring right at us, maw wide and eyes glaring.
—The Wall Street JournalSimon James is an award-winning author and illustrator of many picture books, including George Flies South, the Baby Brains series, and Leon and Bob, which was named a New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated Children’s Book of the Year. Simon James lives in England.CN

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