The Story of Doctor Dolittle - Melissa Dalton Martinez - ★★★.½

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AUTHOR: Melissa Dalton Martinez
ILLUSTRATOR: Tom Tolman
GENRE: Children's Picture Book
PUBLICATION DATE: August 31, 2021
RATING: 3.5 stars.

Tough to believe that the very first Doctor Dolittle story was published more than a hundred years ago in 1920. This picture book contains a much simplified version of the classic story but with an interesting little twist midway.

I was a bit disappointed because the story here doesn’t flow very smoothly. If you have ever heard a child narrating some incident, the flow is usually “I went here. I saw this. And then I went there. I did that. And then I met him…“ You don’t get descriptions or feelings. You get crisp sentences full of actions and you wonder where the story is going. And that’s exactly what this story gives you; one action sentence after another. There is not much smoothness between the scene changes and this leads to some gaps in the plot. But I need to consider it from the target reader’s perspective and that age group is the 2-5 year olds. For them, I am sure that listening to this story will be a wonderful experience as they meet multiple animals, go to strange lands and see new concepts in action within the magical world of Doctor Dolittle.

This is a picture book edition and the illustrations certainly meet the requirement. The graphics in the book are colourful and cute, and will certainly appeal to children.

This would be a wonderful picture book addition to schools, libraries and homes with young readers. It will also work very well as a bedtime read. The vocabulary level is really simple so it will work well for beginner readers too. But I am not sure how far this book will satisfy slightly older readers because they are bound to have a lot of questions about the events in the book. For example, merely saying “Doctor Doolittle escaped” will make little ones happy. But I can hear a five year old uttering that most fear-inducing word for all parents: “How?” As long as parents can fill in the blanks creatively, it is a book worth going for.

Thank you to NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for the ARC of the book in exchange for an honest review.

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