PICTURE BOOKS
Barnett, Mac

How Does Santa Go Down the Chimney?

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Jon Klassen. Barnett and Klassen (The Three Billy Goats Gruff, rev. 1/23, and others) reunite to address the title’s age-old Christmas question. Barnett’s text expertly speculates as a child might, with ideas ranging from the logical (“Maybe Santa knows about the key under the flowerpot”) to the playful (“Or [does he] stretch out like taffy and step in one leg at a time?”). Klassen’s graphite, ink, and digital illustrations add his ever-pleasing straight-faced brand of humor (e.g., Santa doing laundry in his heart-patterned underwear to clean the soot off his suit). Theorizing is more entertaining than discovering an answer would be -- the magic is in the mystery, after all, including the mystery of how Santa gets back up the chimney.

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