How to Track a Truck
Written by Jason Carter Eaton
Illustrated by John Rocco
Candlewick Press   9/27/2016
978-0-7636-8065-7
32 pages    Ages 4—8

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“DO YOU LIKE TRUCKS?

“Do you love them? Do you want to have one for a pet?

“Well, now you can!

“This handy guide has everything you need to track, catch, and tame your very own pet truck.
It answers key questions like:

“Where do trucks live?
How do I catch one?
What should I name my truck?
How do I keep my pet truck from destroying the entire house?

“Follow the hints and tips (and truck tracks), and pretty soon you’ll have a loyal dump truck or monster truck or even a car transporter following you home, a happy hum under its hood.

“With a sixteen-wheeler-size nod to pet-care guides, Jason Carter Eaton and John Rocco put young readers in the driver’s seat for a road trip to truck-lover bliss!” [INSIDE JACKET]

Review
Meet Mike. Mike helps kids find their own pet truck. His style—not his outfit, though it is stylish—is deceptively simple. With a 1, 2, 3 guide, Mike will show kids how they can easily—if they pay attention—track a truck. Along the way, Mike offers tips and hints to help kids have a successful track. The first tip may seem odd. Most kids will go to a pet store for a pet, but not kids who want their own pet truck. Pet stores, curiously, do not offer pet trucks (or, strangely, pet trains).

Here are the easy steps to tracking your own pet truck:

1 – Decide on the breed of truck you want as your pet truck.
2 – Go to its native habitat.
3 – Look for tracks and clues; follow the tracks.
4 – Catch it.
5 – Lead your truck to work.
6 – Offer the Universal Truck Signal.
7 – Name your truck.
8 – Take it home.

Easy, right? Mike does go into detail, offering tips and hints based on his experience. He also includes many instructive illustrations. Kids should be very happy with their new pet, especially if they take Mike’s advice about letting it play with other kids’ pet trucks. Again, he offers a tip on keeping things fun and crash free.
How to Track a Truck is the second volume of the, well, let’s call it the “How to Catch Exotic Pets” series. The first was How to Train a Train. Jason Carter Eaton’s How to Track a Truck will amuse both kids and adults with the fun, logical tips based on how you might find a dog or cat. Kids will love the word play, Mike’s tips, and his hints. Mike is a cheerful, completely optimistic character who is just as easy to like, as it is to track a truck (or train a train).

John Rocco’s illustrations, created in graphite and colored digitally, playfully enhance Eaton’s story. The pet trucks look like regular trucks. Ah, but the headlights, though completely normal, look like the eyes, and, if you look closely, you will see the pet trucks’ emotions in those headlight-eyes. Six kids, shown after successfully tracking a truck and making it their pets, include two girls, neither paired with the gentle ice cream truck. Every spread contains something to make kids giggle, if not guffaw.
Like How to Train a Train before it, How to Track a Truck purely exists to tickle your funny bone. Mike’s kindness returns and translates to the care of the pet trucks. As a read aloud, How to Track a Truck is perfect. It has easy to read, short text on each page along with images a back row of sitting children could see. At home, How to Track a Truck makes for a fun-filled afternoon reading session or a silly bedtime story. Any truck-loving boy or girl will love reading this picture book. For an adorable gift, combine How to Track a Truck with a Tonka truck (or any tough toy truck).

Next Up for Jason Carter Eaton: Great, Now We’ve Got Barbarians! with Mark Fearing (Candlewick Press, 2017)

HOW TO TRACK A TRUCK. Text and illustrations copyright © 2016 by Jason Carter Eaton. Illustrations copyright © 2016 by John Rocco. Reproduced by permission of the publisher, Candlewick Press, Somerville, MA.

Amazon—Indie Books—Candlewick Press

Add How to Track a Truck to Your Goodreads Shelf HERE.
Activity Book is HERE.

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Reprinted with permission from HOW TO TRACK A TRUCK © 2016 by Jason Carter Eaton, Candlewick Press. Illustrations © 2016 by John Rocco.

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Copyright © 2016 by Sue Morris/Kid Lit Reviews. All Rights Reserved

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How to Track a Truck
Written by Jason Carter Eaton
Illustrated by John Rocco
Candlewick Press 9/27/2016
9780763680657