Dragon Gets By

Silly, loveable dragon story for new readers.

Author: Dav Pilkey Illustrator: Dav Pilkey Pages: 48 Publisher: Orchard Books Published Date: 09/01/1996 Genre: Fiction - For Beginning Readers PB Price: $4.99 Publisher's Recommended Reading Level: 4-8 Read Aloud: 4 Read Alone: 6

Common Sense Note

Parents need to know that nothing harmful or inappropriate is presented in this beginning reader.

Families can talk about all the things that go wrong from the time the dragon gets up, and they can laugh together at the silliness. Do you ever feel groggy in the morning? Can you imagine reading an egg and frying the newspaper? What kinds of goofy things have you done when you haven't had enough sleep? On a more serious note, this book presents the perfect forum for discussing the five basic food groups and what really goes in each. Why would cheese curls, doughnuts, ketchup, and pork rinds be bad choices? What would have been better?

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Common Sense Review

Reviewed By: Patricia Tauzer

Beginning readers will get a kick out of all the silly things that happen to the little blue dragon. The pages are full of that goofy, kid-style humor. Older readers may laugh the first time through, but this will not be one of their favorites to read aloud over and over at bedtime.

Part of a large collection of Dragon Tales, this story of the loveable little blue dragon's bad day is slightly reminiscent of the Frog and Toad books, though the adventures are not as developed. Cute, bright cartoon-like drawings done in watercolor with pencil fill the pages, and the accompanying text is easy to read. While kids may not understand all of the humor at first, especially the part about the food groups, they will get caught up in the silliness very quickly.

Besides the Dragon Tales and Captain Underpants series, Dave Pilkey has written the Ricky Ricotta series as well as The Paperboy, which was named a Caldecott Honor Book in 1997.

From The Book

Dragon loved to go shopping.
He was a very wise shopper.
He bought foods only
from the five basic food groups.
He bought cheese curls from the dairy group.
He bought doughnuts from the bread group.

Plot Summary:

Five different stories in this book describe parts of a day in the blue dragon's life. From the time he wakes up, things don't go too well. He reads an egg and fries the newspaper, tries to sweep the dirt from his dirt floor, digs a hole to hold the dirt he has piled up, has a disastrous shopping trip, and after all that, waters his bed and goes to sleep in his plants. The dragon gets by ... but just barely.