On a wet spring night, one big frog sings KA-BLU-URP! Two tiny frogs sing PREEP, PREEP, three young frogs sing RIBBIT, RIBBIT, all the way up to ten frogs who trill PEEP, PEEP as a frog chorus fills the air with grunts and croaks and chirps. The night is resonant until . . . a car splashes down the street and all the frogs, from ten down to one, are hushed! Shirley Parenteau offers a joyfully cacophonous counting-up and counting-down story, vibrantly illustrated by Cynthia Jabar.

This was my first book with Candlewick Press. I had written children's books when my own children were young, but as they grew older, I moved into writing women's fiction. Then on "a wet spring night," I stood on the porch of our near-century old home on acreage near a creek and listened to frogs singing. A car splashed by and the entire story played out as it does in this story. Although I had never before written a counting book, I knew this was one. It led me back into the joyful discoveries of writing for children.