Biscuit Finds a Friend

Review By JESSICA ALMY

My daughter is just learning to read, and she gets easily discouraged when it takes too long to sound out words or figure out a sentence. Luckily, Alyssa Satin Capucilli’s Biscuit books are just about right. While there are a lot of sight words (perhaps because they’re geared to “shared reading”), repetition and a short format make these little books appealing to my kiddo.

Biscuit Finds a Friend is a particularly cute read. Of course, the plot is very simple: Biscuit finds a duckling who has wandered away from the pond, he and the little girl return the duckling to the duck family, and he plays with the duck until — whoops! — he falls into the pond.

Although the mechanics of animal rescue aren’t expounded in this short little book, the concept it introduces is good: To help wild animals, it’s important to return them to their habitat and their family. I particularly like that Biscuit and the girl focus on helping the duckling before they try to play.

This book is perfect for emerging readers — whether they’re 3 or 6.