A pencil and other objects come to life to help a boy write a
story for school Homework. By Arthur Yorinks. Illustrated by
Richard Egielski. Walker, 32 pp., $16.99. Ages 4 and up. By
Janice Harayda Household objects that come to life have been
inspiring brilliant picture books since the Victorian era, when
Randolph Caldecott drew a dish running away with a spoon for Hey
Diddle Diddle. And few creative teams might have seemed better
qualified to preserve the tradition than Richard Egielski, who
won the 1987 Caldecott Medal for his pictures for Hey, Al, and
Arthur Yorinks, who wrote the story for that book. The plot of
their latest collaboration certainly had promise: One night
while he sleeps, a boy named Tony gets help with his homework
from four objects on his desktop – a pencil, an eraser, a
ballpoint pen and a fountain pen. The four decide to write a
story for him about outer space. And the quartet’s bickering and
attempts to improve one another’s work tell children something
important about writing – that