The Dinky Donkey by Craig Smith

Illus. by Katz Crowley. Scholastic, 2019. ISBN: 9781775436065.
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Themes: Donkeys, Verse, Sing-along, Read aloud, Humour, Family. Wonky Donkey's offspring is a little girl. And from there the lines on each double page have a 'hee haw' in its middle, adding a new line each time the page is turned. Easy to read and read aloud and sing along with the downloadable song, The Dinky Donkey is infectious, becoming one of those tunes you keep hearing in your head.
With very cute drawings accompanying the text, no reader will be unimpressed with the list of her attributes.
From being cute and small, to having long eyelashes, liking loud music, to painting her hooves bright pink and so on, each attribute adds one more word to the refrain, dinky donkey. By the end of the story she is a stinky funky plinky-plonky winky-tinky inky-pinky punky blinky Dinky Donkey, and all readers will laugh out loud as they try to say this tongue twister.
Readers will also call out 'hee haw' each time it appears, and try to guess the word added to the donkey's list of qualities. The illustrations recall Wonky Donkey as the artificial leg is shown on several pages, impelling readers to seek out the first book in the series to see what happened to Dinky Donkey's mother.
As a 2010 finalist for the LIANZA Russell Clark Award (Illustration) for The Wonky Donkey (2009) it is wonderful to see a sequel along with music available to have the kids sing along with the words penned by Craig Smith.
Fran Knight