The Boy, The Bear, The Baron, The Bard

Rating:
Summary: A humorous and amazing story
Review: The Boy, The Bear, The Baron, The Bard is a picturebook that presents its humorous and amazing story entirely in sequential, comic-book style illustrations. A young boy playing by himself in an old theater accidentally discovers a way to travel to the distant past - and the time of Shakespeare! Accidentally inciting the Bard's wrath, he flees, liberates a captive bear, rescues a timid baron from the tower of London, all the while evading William Shakespeare's furious pursuit. The whimsical color pictures perfectly relate this chuckle-inducing story all the way to the wistful end.


Rating:
Summary: Brilliant
Review: This book is absolutely brilliant! It is a wordless book that will pick you up and carry you through the story. The boy kicks his soccer ball through the window of a boarded up old theater. After retrieving his ball he discovers a box of costumes which he tries on and tries out on the theater stage. Something happens and suddenly he is on the stage of a theater (the Globe?) and William Shakespeare is tripping on his soccer ball. The chase is on through old London. The boy liberates a bear from a cage, a baron from the Tower of London, and dances with Queen Elizabeth I on a barge on the Thames, all while being pursued by a cranky Shakespeare. The drawings are detailed and change perspective. One moment you are running through the streets of London with the boy and the next you have a view of him and the city from high above. When the story ended, I felt like I too had dropped out of time, quite a feat for a picture book.