An unusual entry in Toon's comic series for beginning readers features one-page comic strips, each with a clever visual punchline. For example, Benjamin Bear says to a fish swimming in a bowl, "Let's go play at your house" and, after dumping the fish in the lake, dons the upside-down fish bowl to wear as a diver's helmet before entering the lake himself. Or, after seeing his rabbit friend jump over a stream, Benjamin Bear builds a bridge for the rabbit, who proceeds to jump over the bridge. It's one laugh after another in this engaging easy reader. The humor is simple enough for new readers and sophisticated enough so that older children will enjoy it, too. (Ages 5-8)

Benjamin Bear walks on water, rides a square-wheeled bicycle, and wears a fishbowl helmet under the sea.

Benjamin Bear walks on water, rides a square-wheeled bicycle, and wears a fishbowl helmet under the sea. Told in the form of one-page comic strips, each of Benjamin's adventures is a hilarious gag, a puzzle, a mini physics lesson, or sometimes all three. Of the first Benjamin book, Horn Book wrote, "Original, deep-down funny . . . steeped in the rare quality of imaginative kindness." Kirkus called it, "A visually formatted joke book to inspire thinking as well as laughs."