Hot Rod Hamster

Hot Rod Hamster by Cynthia Lord
Illustrated by Derek Anderson
2010

     Hamster needs a hot rod.  He wants to race today so he heads to the junkyard to enlist the help of some friends to build a race car.  They build the hot rod part by part and Hamster is ready for the race. Although he's the smallest animal at the race track, Hamster and his hot rod win the race.
     The story of Hot Rod Hamster is simple enough; what makes it such a fun and cool book to read aloud is its illustrations and the great rhythm of its lines:

          Great day, grin day, build a car to win day,
          Cheer day, chase day, gonna have a race day!


          Old car, new car, shiny painted blue car,
          Rust car, clean car, itty-bitty green car. 

You can almost hear yourself turning the lines into a tune.
     Hot Rod Hamster also encourages audience participation.  After each step on the process of building the hot rod, the reader is asked "Which would you choose?"; as we turn the page, we can compare what we chose with the decision made by Hamster.  Fun book to share with all those boys and girls "built for speed!"