Today’s poetry picture book is the third in a fantastic series that blows me away.

Back in 2021, I highlighted the first book in this series (all about wrens) that took nonfiction matter about animal habitats and combined it with poetry in a cumulative form. I can’t believe all of the things that includes! It’s simply boggling! And yet, the author (Randi Sonenshine) and illustrator (Anne Hunter) created this amazing conglomeration of MAGIC not once, not twice, but THREE times!

I somehow missed the second book and had to go back and read it before this one (as I didn’t want to miss anything that this series might include). Even though beavers (the subject of the second book) live in Alaska, I still learned NEW things!

Now, take this formula and throw it into the ocean with one of the most enigmatic creatures on our planet, the octopus, and it’s no wonder that this book created a lot of buzz. THE DEN THAT OCTOPUS BUILT is glorious in every way. There’s even back matter that expands on the story with several surprising facts I won’t spoil. BUT, as usual, it’s deucedly hard to show the cumulative aspects from one poem that runs the entire book, but the page I picked was one that I chose because of the illustration. I saw things that weren’t there. I’m not sure if it’s just me, but I had to look at this picture several times to go “oh yeah, right, that’s not really there!” Is it just me???

And if you’re looking for more poetry fun this month, be sure to check out the Kidlitosphere Event Roundup!  Thank you for stopping by!