Module 9: The Trouble with Chickens

Module 9: The Trouble with Chickens

Summary: J.J. Tully used to be a search-and-rescue dog. Now he lives on a farm with his owner, but the farm life is a bit boring for him. Therefore, when a chicken asks him to find her lost chicks J.J. is ready for the challenge. Vindictive house dogs and ambitious chickens lead J.J through the hoops and put in a predicament that his years of search and rescue have not prepared him for. How can he get out of the bolted cage?

Citation: Cronin, D. (2011). The trouble with chickens.  New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers.

Impression: J.J. Tully is a fun character for young readers to follow. The situations are silly and fun, and easy enough for beginning readers to follow. The jokes are cute, and most young readers would pick up on the jokes easily. The illustrations are well placed and give the reader just enough help with visualizing without taking away the imagination work. This is a great series to get children started with mysteries. 

Review: Popular farmyard chronicler Cronin (Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type, illustrated by Betsy Lewin, 2000, etc.) makes the jump to middle-grade fiction in this faux–hard-boiled mystery featuring talking animals. Her deadpan humor is much in evidence as she describes the circumstances under which retired search-and-rescue dog J.J. Tully undertakes the case of the missing chick. Puns abound, and J.J. is definitely not quite as clever as he believes himself to be, allowing readers to gently laugh at as well as with him. Sophisticated vocabulary and a complicated plot suggest the older range of readers as the most likely audience, but frequent illustrations and a relatively large font should make the story accessible to the younger end as well. Cornell’s black-and-white drawings extend both the humor and the action. In some pictures J.J. is slightly reminiscent of Scooby-Doo, another canine sleuth, while in others he is both distinctive and dogged in his determination to solve the puzzle. The chickens, mother and four chicks, are seriously silly looking and utterly adorable, which suits their surprisingly rounded characters just right.  Finding out how “Vince the Funnel” fits in, whether J.J. is being double-crossed by his client and how the climactic rescue will be resolved should keep readers engaged while Cronin’s constant word-play will keep them giggling. Fast and funny. (Comic mystery. 8-11)

(2011). The trouble with chickens [Book review of The Trouble with Chickens]. Kirkus Reviews.   Retrieved from https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/doreen-cronin/trouble- chickens/

Suggestions: This would be a great book for a book talk in an elementary school about mysteries. The book is simple enough for leisure with some dictionary worthy words to help young minds grow.