Cotton-Top Tamarin's Most Hairific Day - Terri Tatchell - ★★★★.¼

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AUTHOR: Terri Tatchell
ILLUSTRATOR: Ivan Sulima
SERIES: Endangered and Misunderstood Animals, #5
GENRE: Children's Picture Book
RATING: 4.25 stars.

In a Nutshell: Yet another wonderful addition to this series. Informative and entertaining. Loved it!


Story Synopsis:
Little Cotton-Top Tamarin loves her hairdo, and spends a lot of time ensuring that it stands up the right way. She is a generous tamarin, and to ensure that all her friends look equally great, she helps them to groom their hair in the same style, whether they like it or not. Unfortunately, one day, her determination to make sure that everyone has the same fabulous hairstyle lands her in a human village, where she learns some important lessons.


Ever since I read the first book of this collection back in January 2022, I’ve kept a keen eye out for the other books in the series. It is one of the best picture book series for the age group of 3-8 years. This latest book isn't my favourite of the five books as it contains some upsetting scenes that might worry kids. But it is still a wonderful book.

There are many reasons that make this book (and the other books of this series) worth a buy.

🐵 Each book focusses on endangered animals. Thereby, you will always find some novel animals as central characters in these stories. In this latest volume, we get to see the cotton-top tamarin, the sloth, the toucan, and the tapir!

🐵 The book is in rhythmic prose, but the rhymes works excellently for read-aloud. They aren’t forced, nor do they vary in meter. I am not a fan of rhythmic prose, but when it is done so well, I enjoy it.

🐵 The text has a proper story rather than just presenting plain facts about the animal. The tale always ends with a valuable life lesson.

🐵 The plot incorporates the traits of the main creature, thus ensuring that children learn and enjoy at the same time. Children’s books needn’t always be educational, but when they combine entertainment with awareness, their appeal grows magically.

🐵 The rhymes are mostly easy to read and understand. While there might be a sprinkling of difficult words, these aren’t so many as would dissuade a little one from reading.

🐵 The illustrations are always outstanding. They work in sync with the storyline and add much depth to what’s being conveyed in the text.
(What I didn’t know earlier is that series illustrator Ivan Sulima works from Kyiv, and he worked on this book during the war while trying to protect his family. Respect!)

🐵 There is always an author’s note at the end, which contains special facts about the main animals of the story.

🐵 ALL THE PROCEEDS from these books go towards helping endangered animals.

🐵 Courtesy the author, there are free activity sheets, animal facts and resources for parents and teachers on https://www.myanimalbooks.com/endangered-and-misunderstood. Check it out.

You must have guessed my opinion by now. I love this series, and would strongly recommend it to every little one. It will work well for home libraries as well as classroom discussions. The balanced poetic text also makes it a good option for bedtime reading.

In case you are interested in this amazing series, here are the other four books in order, though they are all standalone titles.




When I had read them, each of these titles were available on KU. 

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