Book cover for POP! Goes the Nursery Rhyme featuring illustrations of the feisty weasel and the bossy Secretary bird and decorative type. There is a colorful border with a fox, sheep and other animals and cakes, porridge, pails of water referencing classic nursery rhymes.
A complex and tall sandcastle at a beach is being climbed by illustrated animals including a weasel and a fox carrying pails of water. A raccoon is dumping its bucket of water into the ocean. The text says Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water. Jack fell down and broke his crown, and Jill went . .
At the beach, a big wave is being surfed by the weasel who is wearing pink suspenders. The sandcastle is falling apart and there are pails and a beachball flying around. Secretary bird says No! Oh my goodness, no, no, no. Thee are no weasels with Jack and Jill. How could you . . . ?
A lively illustrated image shows an aqua colored book standing on its spine opened up to pages within. Secretary bird with big eyes is on the back cover. A donkey has his front legs climbing out and bursting from the book. Many other characters from the book are flying out in a colored rainbow, including the weasel, turtle, foxes and more.
On a starry night parent and child foxes sit on a hill under a tree. They are watching fireworks burst as the weasel with a jetpack flies through them. Secretary bird is squawking at the sky saying GAH! And now we have to deal with sky weasels?!? The nursery rhyme text says Twinkle twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are. Up above the world so . . .
A frustrated Secretary bird is throwing up his wings and saying That's it! That's IT! No more weasels! No weasels in the sky or in cakes or rolling down hills or any of that! NO. MORE. WEASELS. Just do a rhyme without a weasel in it. Just one! PLEASE!
Secretary bird keeps anticipating the weasel although weasel is nowhere to be found. The nursery rhyme reads Three, four, shut the door. Fix, six, pick up sticks. The bird is seen wondering Is there a weasel behind that door? He ia also seen buying posicles on a stick saying Oh, here it comes. Here it comes. I can feel it . . .
Back book cover for POP! Goes the Nursery Rhyme has a colorful border with attentive weasel, who is upside down and a fox, sheep and other animals peering at the blurbs from other famous authors. There is a border around illustrated with cakes, porridge, pails of water and other references to classic nursery rhymes.

POP! Goes the Nursery Rhyme

 

In this laugh-out-loud spin on a classic nursery rhyme collection, a feisty weasel continuously interrupts the narrator’s carefully prepared recitation — adding exuberant mischief to the timeless rhymes we all know and love.

The sensible Secretary Bird wants nothing more than to get on with their job of properly narrating a classic nursery rhyme book. But something is afoot in the orderly land of nursery rhymes . . .  a zippy little Weasel has entered the scene! As the Secretary Bird tries to get through the rhymes — from Little Miss Muffet to Jack and Jill — the Weasel bursts in, throwing everything into a comical tailspin. Can the Secretary Bird put an end to the chaos?

In POP! Goes the Nursery Rhyme, influential children’s librarian Betsy Bird and acclaimed illustrator Andrea Tsurumi remix beloved nursery rhymes, serving up a classic-in-the-making packed with hilarious surprises that will have little listeners riveted.

 

ABOUT

Betsy Bird is the collection development manager of Evanston Public Library and writes the blog A Fuse #8 Production for School Library Journal. Betsy is also the author of the picture books Giant Dance Party and The Great Santa Stakeout and the middle-grade novel Long Road to the Circus, illustrated by Caldecott-winning illustrator David Small. She lives in Illinois.

Andrea Tsurumi (they/them) is the author and illustrator of the picture books Accident!, Crab Cake, and I’m on It! (Elephant & Piggie Like Reading!) and the illustrator of books including My Head Has a Bellyache (written by Chris Harris), Mr. Watson’s Chickens (written by Jarrett Dapier), and the Kondo & Kezumi series (written by David Goodner). They live in Philadelphia, PA. Visit Andrea at AndreaTsurumi.com

 

Peeking in at process of character creation with these early pen and ink illustrations.

A peek into the creative process of developing POP’s characters.

Reviews

Editorial Review: Publishers Weekly
Bird (The Great Santa Stakeout) and Tsurumi (There’s No Such Thing as Vegetables) imagine the giggly-good havoc wrought by ending myriad nursery rhymes with “POP! Goes the Weasel.”

The story’s canon-tweaking mischief-maker — introduced in the book’s first featured rhyme — is a weasel in pink overalls who leaps into the framing of each classic final line, generally with arms and legs akimbo. Countering the repeated action with protests, a pearl-clutching secretary bird desperately tries to maintain decorum (“Oh my goodness, no, no, no. There are no weasels with Jack and Jill”), leading to a final scenario that employs jack-in-the-box tension.

Throughout, the characters are elaborately choreographed: Mary, of “Mary Had a Little Lamb” fame, appears as a well-heeled but spunky mutton matron, the little lamb as her cosseted, coolly confident charge. Gaily upsetting the proverbial apple cart again and again, the creators craft a raucous celebration of rule-breaking that will have young readers eagerly anticipating each rhyme’s incoming “POP!”

POP! GOES THE NURSERY RHYME
by Betsy Bird, illustrated by Andrea Tsurumi


PRAISE

“A raucous celebration of rule-breaking that will have young readers eagerly anticipating each rhyme’s incoming “POP!”
—Publishers Weekly, STARRED Review

“Catnip for adults who like to perform their picture books to giggles and guffaws.”
—Kirkus Reviews

“A set piece of early childhood gets a comical comeuppance.”
—Wall Street Journal

“Mother Goose ditties are upended by a frenetic weasel.”
—Kirkus Reviews


BLURBS

“Bursting with playful fun! It’ll be a hit in your household!
—Jeff Kinney, Best selling creator of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series

“A brilliant spin on classic nursery rhymes that is destined to become a classic itself. Get ready for this book to POP into the hearts of readers everywhere and leave them hollering for more!”
—Minh Le, Award winning author of Drawn Together and Life

“My new favorite nursery rhyme book. Find a kid. Read this out loud to them. And it will be your favorite too. Kid comedy gold!”
—Jon Scieszka, Best selling author of The True Story of The Three Little Pigs and The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales

A set piece of early childhood gets a comical comeuppance
—Wall Street Journal

ISBN: 9781454960461 / 48 pages
Ages: 3–5
Publisher: Union Square Kids
Author’s agent: Stephen Barbara, InkWell Management
Illustrator’s agent: Stephen Barr, Writers House

POP! GOES THE NURSERY RHYME IS AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE AT:

BOOKSHOP.ORG

BARNES & NOBLE

BOOKS A MILLION

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Behind The Scenes with Betsy!

As a new mother, I decided I was going to be a good mom and do right by my children. That meant reading them all kinds of literature, including nursery rhymes. So I went out and got all the big compendiums. The large collections by Arnold Lobel and Tomie dePaola, sure, but also smaller ones as well.

As I read through the rhymes, I realized the sheer variety of them out there. I also realized that they get a bit… samey after a while. I mean, you might get a little variation between one rhyme or another, but generally speaking you’re saying the same words over and over again.

Repetition is great for growing brains but it also is a great way to drive a parent a little wonky. As such, I started to get a bit punch drunk. I’d be reading a rhyme normally… and then I’d suddenly end it with, “Pop, goes the weasel!” It never failed to get a laugh. Toddler comedy gold! And so it occurred to me… maybe there was a book in this.