Princess Pistachio and Maurice the Magnificent by Marie-Louise Gay
This book is part of the series featuring Princess Pistachio series. Here Pistachio watches her dog, whose name is Dog, sleeping and wonders what he dreams about. She realizes that all he does is eat and sleep, and thinks that she must liven up his life a little. She tries to get him moving to no effect. The next morning, she puts him in her school bag and takes him to school. It turns out to be show and tell day, and Pistachio forgot to bring something, so she decides to show Dog. But her classmates make fun of the dog. When she spots an advertisement for a dog to audition for a role in a play a few days later, she decides to take Dog, despite her best friend Madeline's laughter. It turns out that Dog does have the special talent required for the role, and Pistachio must come up with a stage name that is more exciting for him, hence the name from the title of the book.
As Dog's success continues, it changes the dynamic between Pistachio and Madeline, and both end up learning something about themselves and friendship from the situation.
I liked the way the book showed that everybody has undiscovered talents, despite first impressions. I also liked the way the situation led to new understanding for both Pistachio and Madeline, and modeled a good way to deal with issues between friends.
My only difficulty with the plot was when Dog ate an eraser at school. To me this seemed like a bad message, maybe getting kids to think about feeding something like that to their dog for fun. Unfortunately, I had a cat who took it upon himself to eat an eraser, which proved to be life-threatening to him and very expensive to me. So I'd like to emphasize to NEVER DO THAT!!
See unfortunate results below.
Thanks to Pajama Press for providing me with a free copy to review.
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