Miss Spider's Tea Party
   David Kirk
  1994 Scholastic Press-Callaway NY USA
   ISBN: 0590477242


Miss Spider is quite comfortable about how she looks so she doesn't understand why all the other bugs are scared of her. Miss Spider, being a bit lonely, wants to have a party - how can she make friends?

"You must agree," Miss Spider said,
"My shape is fine and round
A countenance agreeable,
As any can be found.
So why do insects run away,
As they catch sight of me.
When all that I am trying to do,
Is ask them in for tea?"

Tea parties have been a constant in my life from when I was a little girl to much later when I joined a quilting bee, so I was intrigued by this book's title & the glowing, big pictures.

In Miss Spider's Tea Party we meet a roly-poly lonely spider who would like some company. Every time she invites insects in for tea they flee in terror.

David Kirk's oil-on-paper pictures are dazzling, color-filled & charming, I particularly enjoy the ornaments on the text pages.

In an amusing rhyming story we follow Miss Spider's efforts to make friends in her neighborhood, from scared beetles to careful bees to snobby ants until it rains & a small miracle occurs to gladden Miss Spider's heart.

While I enjoyed this little book with its big pages, I was taken aback by the aspect of telling us that spiders don't eat insects. I realize there is a different moral to this story & can only hope fictional spiders can get by on only petals & tea.
(01/23/00)

Rebecca