This incarnation of the Cinderella story features a kindhearted elephant and her "Furry Godmouse," with the wicked stepsisters depicted as warthogs. There is little other novelty in the text, which stays true to the original tale: "As she rushed from the palace, she dropped one of her beautiful shoes." However, the wacky, cartoon-style art is perfectly suited to depict lumbering fairy-tale elephants. (c) Copyright 2014. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Is it a bird? No! Is it a plane? Sort of. It's Elecopter, a blue elephant with propellers and landing gear who flies over the African savanna returning baby birds to their nests, administering haircuts to lions and rescuing animals from wildfires. Slack ("Monkey Truck") sees great comic possibilities in his flying pachyderm's unusual abilities. Fierce in the face of danger and always kind, this motherly elephant gives Elecopter parenting a good name. A MAMMOTH IN THE FRIDGE By Michaël Escoffier. Illustrated by Matthieu Maudet. 36 pp. Gecko Press. $16.95. (Picture book; ages 3 and up) "Dad! Dad! There's a mammoth in the fridge," the big brother shouts. His father looks cross; his sister seems worried. After the fire department chases the poor mammoth up a tree, everyone goes to bed - until a little voice calls, "Here, kitty, kitty! " and brings the imaginary friend back home. Originally published in France, this amusing and absurd book gains much of its humor from Maudet's action-packed pencil drawings, colored in stylish blocks of intense orange, blue, red and white. ELEPHANT'S STORY Written and illustrated by Tracey Campbell Pearson. 40 pp. Margaret Ferguson Books/Farrar, Straus & Giroux. $17.99. (Picture book; ages 4 to 8) As Gracie walks home from school, a book falls from her backpack. A well-meaning elephant finds it, sniffs the book's words right up his trunk, and sneezes them out in a jumble. Animal friends try to put the words back, but the alligator wants to eat them, the seal wants to juggle them, and so on. Like all the best books, this one can be read on several levels, and kids ready for simple deciphering will enjoy Pearson's anagrams. CINDERELEPHANT Written and illustrated by Emma Dodd. 32 pp. Arthur A. Levine Books/Scholastic. $16.99. (Picture book; ages 4 to 8) With elephant books, the laughs seem to take care of themselves. Put an elephant on a bicycle, add some very silly puns ("Prince Trunky's decisions carry a lot of weight"), and just like that, you've given your readers a serious case of the giggles. Or does Dodd just make it look easy? In her retelling of "Cinderella," the fairy godmother is a furry godmouse and the stepsisters warthogs. Like Cinderelephant's huge slipper, subject and story are an unlikely but delightful fit. TUG-OF-WAR Written and illustrated by John Burningham. 32 pp. Candlewick Press. $16.99. (Picture book; ages 5 to 7) Not every storybook elephant is amiable. Burningham has rewritten an African folktale he illustrated 45 years ago, and his elephant is downright nasty. He and his pompous friend Hippopotamus bully Hare, calling him a "big-whiskered nerd" and a "sickly little twerp." Hare may be small, but he has a better brain than his tormentors, and plays a pretty good trick on them. Burningham's new text is typically unsentimental; school-age boys will probably find it outrageously funny. QUEENIE One Elephant's Story By Corinne Fenton. Illustrated by Peter Gouldthorpe. 24 pp. Candlewick Press. $16.99. (Picture book; ages 5 to 7) The true story of Queenie, an Indian elephant captured in the wild and taken to the Melbourne Zoo, is imbued with a sense of the unknowability of such animals. For 40 years, children and other visitors to the zoo took howdah rides on Queenie's back, attended her birthday parties and fed her apples. But in 1944, she killed a keeper for no apparent reason. Gouldthorpe's realistic illustrations and Fenton's carefully researched history give this tale due poignancy. BITS AND PIECES Written and illustrated by Judy Schachner. 32 pp. Dial. $17.99. (Picture book; ages 3 to 5) "For a cat, Tink was an odd duck," Schachner begins, in the clever, joking voice of her Skippyjon Jones books. Seen in Schachner's fuzzy, soft-toned pictures, Tink, a bat-eared kitty with a brain "the size of a frozen pea," goofs around at home, licking the butter and generally getting into mischief. After a lifetime of hankering for the outdoors, he finally slips through the door and gets the adventure he's been yearning for. There's a lot more to it, and it's a delight from start to finish. CAPTAIN CAT Written and illustrated by Inga Moore. 48 pp. Candlewick Press. $15.99. (Picture book; ages 3 to 7) Captain Cat just can't say no to a furry face: his ship, the Carlotta, has more cats aboard than sailors. One day a storm blows him clear off the charts. The island where he lands has an exuberant teenage queen and a dreadful infestation of rats; Captain Cat's feline cargo is suddenly very valuable. Moore's detailed crosshatched pictures - in a style familiar from her illustrations for "The Wind in the Willows" and "The Secret Garden" - add charm to this warmhearted story. MR. WUFFLES! Written and illustrated by David Wiesner. 32 pp. Clarion Books. $17.99. (Picture book; ages 4 to 8) In this brilliant book, Wiesner ("Flotsam," "Tuesday") unleashes the dramatic visual storytelling that won him three Caldecott Medals. Mr. Wuffles, a house cat, has a silly name that belies his predatory nature. Uninterested in toys, he takes notice of a tiny spaceship. Alternating full-page illustrations with graphic- novel-like grids, Wiesner tells a tale of alien visitors and their ant allies. The dusty space under the radiator turns out to be the suburban equivalent of the Lascaux caves. LOST CAT Written and illustrated by C. Roger Mader. 32 pp. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. $17.99. (Picture book; ages 4 to 8) "Lost Cat," Mader's first book for children, is as handsome as the big-eyed tabby that stares out from its cover. The cat, bereft of her owner and searching for a new human to adopt, encounters a trucker, a motorcycle man and even a horse, all depicted from the cat's low-to-the-ground perspective. Mader uses pastels to create his close-up illustrations; deep-hued woodland and sunset scenes communicate how big, mysterious and enticing the natural world is to this formerly housebound cat. DRAT THAT CAT! Written and illustrated by Tony Ross. 32 pp. Andersen Press USA. $16.95. (Picture book; ages 4 to 9) Suzy Cat has so much white fur she looks like a cross between a puli and Cousin Itt. Though beloved, she is no angel: she scratches a sofa to ribbons, piddles in Dad's golf bag, bites Grandpa and pulls down the curtains. "Drat that cat!" resounds through the house - until Suzy decides to remind her humans just how much they really love her. Everything about this book feels British, from Ross's slapdash drawings (not unlike those of Quentin Blake) to the family's cozy house and unsentimental, madcap expressions. Enjoy with a cup of tea, real or imaginary. ONLINE A slide show of this week's illustrated books at nytimes.com/books.

An extra-large take on the classic fairy tale. The Warty Sisters, Cinderelephant's warthog cousins, work the poor elephant mercilessly--in the first illustration, she has a pot handle in one hand and a mop in the other, and there's an iron at the end of her trunk--and leave her sad and lonely when they depart for Prince Trunky's ball. But a swish of her Furry Godmouse's tail instantly transforms Cinderelephant's clothes and makes a limo appear. Of course, she becomes the belle of the ball, as Prince Trunky is afraid of squashing the other, smaller guests. Indeed, synonyms for "large" dot the text. Some wordplay will go right over readers' heads: "Cinder-irrelevant!" But other instances will be in tune with a kid's sense of humor, as when the Furry Godmouse tells Cinderelephant to have a good time, but, "and it's a big but." This is juxtaposed with an illustration of Cinderelephant's huge derrire as she bends down to get into the white stretch limo. Unfortunately, though, while the illustrations have moments of humor, they don't otherwise stand out; despite Dodd's oversized subject, the details often get lost in the digital artwork, and the sparkly cover, while it may attract readers, isn't enough to keep them coming back. And why, with all the possibilities available to her, does Dodd limit herself to names so unfunny and -punny? Other fractured versions are funnier, while many straightforward versions are far more beautiful; opt for them. (Fractured fairy tale. 4-7)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

PreS-Gr 1-In this fractured fairy-tale version of "Cinderella," the heroine and royal family are elephants, the mean relatives are warthogs, and the guests at the ball are a veritable zoo. The fairy godmother is the Furry Godmouse, one of the groan- or giggle-inducing puns sprinkled throughout the story. Most of the traditional plot elements remain unchanged-the magical transformation, the ball, the happily-ever-after with the prince-but the fancy carriage is a limo, and the slipper is too large for everyone except Cinderelephant. Digitally rendered cartoon illustrations pop with bold black outlines and contrasting bright colors and textures. Spreads amply accommodate the sizable protagonist, adding visual humor to the story. As Cinderelephant squeezes her derriere into the limo, the Furry Godmouse's line reads, "enjoy yourself.but, and it's a big but." Cinderelephant's pink dress and pink, glittery shoes are sure to attract fans of Pinkalicious and Fancy Nancy. It's a fun though less-innovative retelling than Tony Johnston's Bigfoot Cinderrrrrella (Putnam, 1998) or Ellen Jackson's Cinder Edna (HarperCollins, 1994).-Yelena Alekseyeva-Popova, formerly at Chappaqua Library, NY (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Staying true to the plot points of the traditional tale, Cinderelephant, living with the Warty Sisters, is pictured in wide-eyed, innocent dismay, a pot in one hand, a broom in the other, and an iron in her trunk. When they are invited to Prince Trunky's ball, the sisters call her Cinder-irrelevant and leave her at home. Good thing she has a Furry Godmouse. He delivers the usual caveat as she struggles to get her posterior through the door of her ride, a stretch limo ( but, and it's a big but . . . ) . Cartoony digital art features eye-catching patterns and bold lines that capture the action. Dodd walks the fine line between making jokes at Cinderelephant's expense and provoking sympathy for her; she could, after all, squash the Warty Sisters, but she is an astonishingly gentle soul who will, in the future, be living large. Quirky children will adore this. For larger collections.--McDermott, Jeanne Copyright 2010 Booklist

Dodd (Meow Said the Cow) proves there's still plenty of life in the oldest of fairy tales. She casts elephants in both the lead role and as the prince, moves the whole affair into the modern day (Cinderelephant goes to the ball in a white stretch limo), and offers new criteria for a soul mate: "Prince Trunky was bored. He didn't want to dance with any of the girls-he was worried they might get squashed! If only he could find someone a bit more his type." There are plenty of visual and verbal jokes-housework is still a chore, even with a vacuum cleaner and washing machine; the heroine's warthog cousins (standing in for stepsisters) meanly call her "Cinder-irrelevant"-but this is no mere spoof. In fact, the book exudes a palpable sense of an author connecting with her heroine's loneliness and yearnings, while loving every inch of Cinderelephant's plus-plus-plus-size body. That's right, it takes a pachyderm Cinderella-and an artist of Dodd's caliber-to encapsulate this familiar character's full humanity. Ages 4-8. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.