Sleepy Pendoodle

Malachy Doyle (author)

Julie Vivas (illustrations)

Walker Books, UK: 2001

ISBN: 0744575087

Genres: animals, humour, picture book

‘Open your eyes, Sleepy Pendoodle. Open your eyes, you pup!'

This charming picture book is wonderful to share with readers of almost any age and adults will find that they enjoy it almost as much as children.

Malachy Doyle says that he got the idea for this book in ‘a story I first came across in a collection of Irish folk tales by Professor Henry Glassie'.

Wherever it started, this is a story guaranteed to delight readers. A little girl is ‘out down the alley' when she finds a puppy, all lost and alone. She brings it home to look after but is concerned when, after a week and despite being well fed, he still hasn't opened his eyes. She seeks the advice of her Uncle Hughie, who gives her a series of instructions about what she should do. The rest of the story is about how she gets these instructions hilariously confused, until she finally hits on the correct sequence, which magically causes her pup to open his eyes.

The story is sweet but once again it is Julie Vivas' humorous and joyful watercolour illustrations that really bring it to life and cause the reader to laugh. The puppy is an adorable soft bundle as cuddly as a teddy bear. The little girl's black hair is tied up in lots of little bunches on her head, a perfect expression of both her youth and her enthusiasm for life. Vivas captures an incredible range of expressions on the child's face, from frustration through tenderness to great joy, and these expressions are echoed in small details such as the way the hands are held, or the way the toes curl.

Perfect for lap-reading or a bedtime story, this is an absolute gem.

Highly recommended.