It's Useful to Have a Duck

I first heard about It's Useful to Have a Duck when Mac Barnett (author of former Kids' Book of the Week Sam and Dave Dig a Hole) called it "a perfect board book," so I brought it in the store, and it's pretty adorable. On one side of a 16-page accordion foldout you have the story of a boy who found a duck and found him useful. On the other side, though, it's the duck who found the boy. And their parallel perceptions are odd and droll: The boy says he uses the duck "to dry off" (by sticking it in his ear); the duck, for the same drawing, says "I wax my bill." (I think the duck's getting the better of that deal.)