Scarry, Richard. Busiest Fire Fighters Ever!. Golden Books, 1993.

Richard Scarry wrote and illustrated more than 300 books during the course of his prolific career. And they have been and continue to be some of the best-selling and most popular picture books in the world. I must admit that I rather avoided Busytown when I was reading aloud to my own children because, well, Busytown can be awfully busy. The big Busytown books, such as Cars and Truck and Things That Go, What Do People Do All Day? and Busy, Busy Town, have multiple storylines going on at the same time on multiple levels on the page, and lots of characters, and it’s hard to find the correct sequence to read the story in, and . . . well, kids love them, but I didn’t, at least not for read aloud time.

However, the Little Golden Books by Scarry cut all of that busyness in Busytown down to size. In Busiest Fire Fighters Ever, Sparky, Smokey, Snozzle, and Squirty (pigs) are the fire fighters. They help the people of Busytown by solving all sorts of problems from lost keys to pigs stuck in trees. They also stand ready to respond to a fire call. But when the fire fighters put out the wrong fire and spoil the Greenbug family’s barbecue, they are quick to respond by hosting the Greenbug family at the firehouse for a fire fighter barbecue.

There’s only one sequential story in this book, just a fun little story about how fires can be good or bad and how fire fighters can be helpers in the community in many different ways. It talks about fire in a way that recognizes the dangers of uncontrolled fires, but isn’t scary for young children. Somebody on Amazon wished the fourth fire fighter pig wasn’t called “Squirty”, but I thought the name was cute and appropriate. Squirty squirts the firehose. Mr. Frumble makes an appearance in the story, too, and he’s always good for a preschool laugh or two.

I added this Little Golden Book to the lists in the new edition of Picture Book Preschool. The other Picture Book Preschool book by Richard Scarry is Richard Scarry’s Please and Thank You Book.