[ Originally written in July 2008.  It’s such a “me write good” review.  I did it for a course assignment, if that’s any excuse! ]

Kate DiCamillo.  Mercy Watson Fights Crime.  Illustrated by Chris Van Dusen.  Candlewick, 2006.  70 pages.  Age 6 to 8.

Mercy Watson, the domesticated “porcine wonder” star of DiCamillo’s transitional reader series, returns in this episode to unwittingly foil a burglary.  Mercy is motivated almost exclusively by hot buttered toast.  She happens across the crime when she hears the screech of the toaster, and becomes animated only upon smelling the thief’s Butter Barrel candy.  The antagonist, Leroy Ninker, is not only a burglar, but a wannabe cowboy.  The reader is given no indication why he is either, and none is wanted.  The characters wisely have no backstory.  Mercy’s owners, who refer to each other only as Mr. and Mrs. Watson, are straight from a 1950s sitcom.  How they came to own a pig who sleeps in her own bed is immaterial.

Were DiCamillo’s story is at all short on comedy, the illustrations add their own humor.  The characters are not meant to be seen realistically, and Van Dusen makes this evident with his bright, comical gouache illustrations.  Their complexions shine like a teenager’s nightmare, with rosy cheeks all around. Mercy looks like an oversized piggy bank come to life. (In the Watsons’ kitchen there is a cookie jar that looks as though it might be Mercy’s kid sister, had she cheerfully survived a lobotomy.)  In an end note, Van Dusen reports that he based Ninker’s likeness on the weasel—long nose, no chin, etc.—but his appearance is silly, complete with a non-obscuring black eye mask, and one can think no ill of him.  Indeed, Mrs. Watson wants nothing more than to feed him toast…with “a great deal of butter,” of course.

The text has all the right ingredients of a good transitional reader:  the vocabulary is easy, the sentences are simple, and the plot is compelling and uncomplicated.  While DiCamillo’s middle grade novels stand out for their rich character development, the Mercy Watson series shows that she is equally adept at plot-driven stories.  All in all, this is a fun read that will brighten any beginning-reader collection.

other reviews:
Kids Lit | The Reading Tub | 7-Imp