The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

October 13, 2007 – 6:08 pm

This book is one of my four year old son’s favourite books. I have
found him asleep with this book in his bed, sat on the sofa with it, and packed
in his overnight to Grandma’s bag countless times.

It is a simple little story book. Each page has a simple illustration
of a caterpillar and what he is doing. It starts off with the egg sat on a
leaf under the light of the moon, to its hatching, and then we follow the
hungry caterpillar on his food journey.

He is very hungry indeed, and munches his way through the usual leaves,
before getting greedy and eating silly things like watermelons, ice cream
cones, salami, etc. He gets a rather deserved tummy ache from that in a
light hearted moment, and when he gets to feeling better, spins a cocoon. We
then get the “surprise” of seeing him emerge a butterfly.

The story has a gentle tone, and is matter of fact. The pictures themselves
echo this feel, and rather than being mere drawings, are actual pieces of
art created by photographing collages made by layering multiple pieces of
paper. Another rather fun bit is the fact that where the caterpillar has
munched his way through something, we have a finger sized hole and the pages
are staggered so that as we see the pictorial list of what he has eaten on
each page, they make a larger picture.

You can get his book in paperback, hardback, or like we did, as a board
book. I highly recommend the board book version as it will be handled a lot,
and the board type pages stand up better to the finger poking that will
ensue through the holes!

I have seen this book practically everywhere that sells children’s books,
on and offline. You can expect to pay about £4.99 for it, and it is well
worth the price. Fun and educational, it is suitable for ages 18 months
to 5 years.