THE LITTLE RED CRANE

Dex is just a small mini, or spider, crane, best suited to interior work. Still, when a letter comes inviting his operator, Pete, to help with an “incredibly BIG project,” the two hop to it. To get there, they must journey over land and across the sea, passing myriad different cranes on the way. Passing a relatively human-scale loader crane and telescopic crane, the truck carrying Dex reaches the waterfront and is loaded onto a ship, allowing him to encounter jaw-droppingly massive shipbuilding, ship-to-shore, offshore, floating, and tower cranes. In the face of the sheer gargantuan size of their mechanics, Dex is baffled as to why he was selected for any kind of important job. Happily, his merit is made clear when he unloads and lifts the different parts of a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton within a museum. While each crane Dex comes into contact with exhibits anthropomorphic features (eyes, faces, etc.), this does not detract from the awe they will inspire in construction-obsessed young readers. Deft watercolors bring the sheer scale of this storyline to life, with sweet-faced Dex the friendliest little red spider crane you ever did see. Alas, but one crane is gendered female, offsetting only slightly the otherwise male-heavy cast.

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