The Hoboken Chicken Emergency
by Daniel Manus Pinkwater

This frequent guest on National Public Radio is probably best known for this tale of a Polish immigrant's son in Hoboken, New Jersey, who one Thanksgiving Day goes out to pick up his family's turkey from the butcher shop. He returns instead with a live, five-foot tall, 266-pound chicken named Henrietta, whom he adopts as a pet. For an explanation of this strange result, you just have to read the book.

Soon Henrietta is running loose in the streets and causing all kinds of chaos, things come to such a desperate pass that the mayor falls for a charlatan "chicken hunter," before the true solution turns out to be teaching everyone not to fear what they do not understand, and to be kind to chickens.

For sheer, rib-tickling loopiness, I recommend this and many other titles by Daniel M. Pinkwater, also known as D. Manus Pinkwater, and several other confusing but similar pen names.

Robbie Fischer
Arizona USA

Recommended Age: 10+

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