“Like Phyl­lis Root’s Rat­tle­trap Car, this charm­ing pic­ture book is filled with hilar­i­ous, slap­dash prob­lem solv­ing and irre­sistible sounds. After years of wish­ful think­ing, Mr. McGreely plants a gar­den and eager­ly awaits his fresh veg­eta­bles. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, a group of naughty rab­bits nib­bles his crop. Angry and deter­mined, Mr. McGreely sur­rounds his plot first with a fence, then with a moat — but the rab­bits eas­i­ly over­come each obsta­cle. Final­ly, hav­ing sur­round­ed the gar­den with a fortress akin to a max­i­mum-secu­ri­ty prison, Mr. McGreely is sure his veg­eta­bles are safe — until he opens the door to har­vest his crop. Karas’ sketchy, child­like illus­tra­tions won­der­ful­ly echo the sto­ry’s humor and farce and make lov­able char­ac­ters of McGreely and the rab­bits alike. But it’s the words that will real­ly cap­ture the audi­ence. Flem­ing describes the rab­bits’ shenani­gans in play­ful streams of ono­matopoeia (“Tip­py-tip­py-tip­py, Pat! Dig-scrablee, Scratch! Scratch! Scratch!”) that will keep kids glee­ful­ly chant­i­ng along, while the rest of the sto­ry unfolds with the sim­ple, cap­ti­vat­ing lan­guage of a good folk­tale. With all the live­ly action and slap­stick com­e­dy, this delight­ful offer­ing is sure to be a huge crowd pleas­er and a sto­ry hour favorite.” (Gillian Eng­berg, Book­list, starred review)