Make Way! Lucky Ducklings by Eva Moore
It is a beautiful day, and a mother sets out with her little ones for a walk through town to the park. They stop for a snack, and then make their way back home, Mom leading the way.
Nothing unusual about this story, except that this mom is a mallard duck and her five babies are ducklings. As they make their way from their home pond and into town, some pedestrians ignore them, some gawk, and some grin at the little yellow ducklings waddling and scuttling along the city sidewalks, trying to keep up with Mama.
"WHACK-A-WHACK!" MAMA DUCK CALLED
TO HER BROOD. "FOLLOW ME!"
AND PIPPIN, BIPPEN, TIPPIN, DIPPIN, AND...LAST OF ALL, LITTLE JOE LINED UP BEHIND HER.
The ducks visit the park and emerge into a parking lot on the other side, where Pippen, Bippen and Tippin stop to tear into a cast-off half of a candy bar and Dippin and Little Joe compete for a piece of a soft pretzel dropped there. It's quite an outing for the little ones, and everyone is having a great time until Mama Duck blithely hops off the curb and heads across the street. She waddles easily across a storm grating, but when the young ducks dutifully follow, it's a duckling disaster.
First, Pippen falters, and drops down between the bars of the grating, and then one by one, Bippin, Tippin, Dippin, and lastly Little Joe, fall through to join him!
OH, DEAR! THAT COULD HAVE BEEN THE END OF THE STORY, BUT IT WASN'T BECAUSE...A WOMAN CRIED, "ALL THE BABY DUCKLINGS FELL INTO THE STORM DRAIN!"
"CALL THE FIRE DEPARTMENT!"
The passersby all stop and peer down into the grating, hearing the five little ones quacking up a fearful ruckus below the street. The firemen--Joe, Paul, and Dennis--rush from their truck but all three of them are unable to open the grate. Mama Duck is frantic. "Whack-a-Whack!"
"OH, DEAR! THAT COULD HAVE BEEN THE END OF THE STORY, BUT IT WASN'T, BECAUSE... A MAN NAMED PERRY HAD AN IDEA.
A passing truck driver named Perry pulls over and pulls a steel cable from his truck, hooks one end to the grate and one to his hitch, and applies some horsepower to pulling it slowly but surely loose from the opening. Fireman Paul climbs down and passes Bippen, Pippen, Tippin, Dippin, and lastly Little Joe up, where Fireman Joe provides a pan of water where they swim happily. Mama Duck, however, is NOT happy. That's not the ending to this outing that she had foreseen!
Mama calls the little ducklings three times and steps into the street to walk them straight back home--and right into traffic.
"OH, DEAR, THAT COULD HAVE BEEN THE END OF THE STORY....
But luckily, Fireman Dennis, thinking quickly, steps out to halt the traffic so that Mama Duck and five very lucky ducklings can cross and continue back to the safety of their pond.
All's well that ends well, and that, dear, reader, that view of six happy duck tails paddling placidly off into the sunset, is indeed THE END of this true tale.
Truth is often stranger than fiction, and based on a true incident occurring in Montauk, New York, Eva Moore's just-published Lucky Ducklings (Scholastic, 2013), eerily parallels the framework of Robert McClosky's evergreen 1942 Caldecott winner, Make Way for Ducklings (Puffin Storytime) in both its plotline and its illustrations by Nancy Carpenter, whose retro but realistic digitally colored charcoal drawings portray both the drama and the humor in this gentle story in the spirit of McCloskey's own style. Carpenter's portrayal of Little Joe hanging head down by his little webbed feet in the grate and the ducklings-eye view of concerned children peering down through the bars at their plight are priceless. Eva Moore's narration, with its oft-repeated phrases, has a cadence that will charm youngsters, and this well-told tale of not-so-streetwise ducks and the urban safety net that helpful humans provide has all the heart of its venerable predecessor. As Kirkus Reviews able critic says, ",,, this book impresses all on its own with its fine design, compelling story, expressive images and gentle environmental message."