Reviewed by Wendy Lipke
This children’s book by American writer, Amy Timberlake, is the third in her Skunk and Badger stories. Because of the author’s nationality some of the words in this story were new to me, such as mukluk which I discovered is a sealskin or reindeer-skin boot typically worn by Indigenous peoples of usually arctic regions of Alaska, Canada, Greenland.
All the characters are animals, but the story revolves around Badger. He has a Rock Diploma and writes articles for the Rock Hound Weekly. His next article is due in five days’ time. He is not alone. He now shares his house with Skunk, and they have become used to each other, Skunk doing the cooking while Badger cleans and does his writing.
All is going well when they are landed with two tiny rat pups who have lost their mother. Badger believes that as he is used to watching rocks, watching a tiny rat or two shouldn’t be too difficult. He likes rules and believes these are the key to rat-raising. He is determined to teach the little rats lots of things among which is the game, Rock Paper Scissors, however, with their large teeth the Scissors becomes Incisors. ‘Sometimes they dug and gnawed. (This wasn’t a behaviour one wanted in a houseguest…)’.
The story that follows is about Badger’s priorities and making room for the needs of others in his household. He is soon out of his depth, especially when his charges grow so quickly, won’t sleep at night, become very quick and agile and come up with such amusing things to fill in their time.
Help arrives in the form of chickens, and an attempt is made to try to finish his article by the due time. Where once he was the sole occupant of his brownstone house until Skunk moved in, now, at one stage, the house was home to one mother bear, three bear cubs, two rats, a skunk and a badger. Also, chickens kept stopping by. He had discovered that by letting one animal into his life meant that others followed.
Throughout the story Badger comes to learn much about himself and what he believes to be important in his life going forward.
The story is an interesting one, but it is the writing style that makes it different. There are many words with a play on sound and lots of alliteration. Some words are given emphasis by presenting them in capital letters. There are lots of bracketed explanations e.g. ‘they ran into (or rather skidded into)’, ‘It tilted its head one way (left eye, blink)’. Some of the bracketed insertions were of a more academic nature, such as, ‘Terminal Moraine (which was a big hill)’. Skunk, however, kept calling it “TERMINAL MERINGUE!”.
There is also a section of the book which describes some good rules for writing and setting priorities. The story is presented on cream paper which is thicker than that in usual adult novels and the words are well spaced for easy reading. The book is presented with a hard cover for the endurance of a children’s book.
Throughout the book are black and white sketches and a couple of coloured illustrations appropriate to the story. These are done by Canadian author-illustrator Jon Klassen. He has received the Order of Canada in recognition of this work.
An interesting story.
Rock Paper Incisors
(2025)
by Amy Timberlake
Illustrated by Jon Klassen
Allen & Unwin
ISBN:978-1760877064
$24.99; 196pp