The Horrendous Hullabaloo - Hardcover

Mahy and MacCarthy ( 17 Kings and 42 Elephants ) are once again delightfully paired in this sprightly feminist tale about a chauvinist pirate and the clever old woman who tends his house, "keeping everything shipshape." When Pirate Peregrine refuses to take his aunt and parrot to the horrendous hullabaloos he attends when he's in town, they decide to have a party of their own. The neighbors, initially "too petrified by pirates" to attend, are eventually enticed to come by the "flapping and fluttering" of the parrot's friends, who--"like rollicking rags of rainbow"--make the affair unforgettable. By the time Peregrine returns to a house strewn with parrot feathers and crumbs from baked rumblebumpkins, his aunt and the parrots are "stealing away on Peregrine's own pirate ship . . . in search of passion fruit, pineapples and palm trees," and he is forced to tidy up his house himself. Mahy's language is spiced with alliterative amusements, and MacCarthy's brilliantly colored batik paintings celebrate the joyful noise a proper hullabaloo should make. Ages 3-8.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The illustrator of Mahy's 17 Kings and 42 Elephants (1987) joins the author for another ebullient story. Peregrine, a pirate, depends on an accommodating aunt who not only keeps his house but pours his rum and pets his parrot. Peregrine goes to parties but never invites his aunt (``You wouldn't enjoy pirate parties...The hullabaloo is horrendous!''). Undeterred, she mixes up a batch of ``rumblebumpkins'' and sends out invitations. Her friends don't come (it's a pirate's house, after all), but the parrots do, which attracts the neighbors; after a grand hullabaloo, his aunt leaves the mess to Peregrine and sails away on his ship with the parrots. The wordplay here is delightfully perky (lots of the words start with ``p''); the subtext, also typical Mahy, is witty, wise, and a bit wicked. McCarthy's batik- style, white-bordered art glows appropriately with the bright colors of the sea and of tropical birds. An entertaining tale, perfect for sharing. (Picture book. 4-8) -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.