A cute and sweet story a pea who wants to get big. The illustration is so simple and goes with the story ( )

The Little Pea is a great example for kids who are hard to convince to eath their veggies.
Little pea is a happy little pea that enjoys life, except for one thing...Candy! His favorite dessert is spinach. ( )

Fun read. My daughter loves the fact that the pea hates candy, but loves spinach! ( )

Cute story about a pea who must eat candy before having a treat. ( )

This book is a fun story about a pea who has to eat candy every night for supper and his dessert is spinnach. This would be a great story for encouraging healthy eating in young kids. ( )

Audience: Ages 3-8.

Annotation: Little Pea loves his family but hates to eat his dinner: candy.

Review: Little Pea is an adorable book that is both humorous and fun. In a family of peas, little pea enjoys the love and attention of his parents. Yet what he hates is finishing his dinner. Author Amy Rosenthal pokes fun at a common children’s dilemma of eating food they don’t like. Yet this time the disagreeable food is candy and dessert is spinach. Children will enjoy the humor of the story as well as the fun illustrations. Illustrator Jean Corace takes ordinary human situations and translates them into the world of peas; tiny peas swing on swing sets, roll down hills and play hopscotch. This clever story should be a hit with young children who will get a kick out of seeing Little Pea struggle to swallow each one of the brightly colored candies.

Citations: The reviews emphasize the joy that children will experience listening to Rosenthal’s playful twist on family dinner time. I wonder if this picture book will loose its appeal with children after the first few reads, especially since the plot depends on joke.

Publishers Weekly 252.19 (May 9, 2005)
Kirkus Reviews 73.9 (May 1, 2005) ( )

My older niece doesn't like spinach. Not even after reading this book :)

She eats other vegetables, though. I bought this book because she liked it when we checked it out of the library, not to teach a moral lesson.

We both think it's really funny that Little Pea has to eat candy in order to get spinach, and the illustrations of Little Pea's day are perfectly well done.

I definitely recommend it. ( )

From the engaging illustrations by Jen Corace to the clever text by Amy Krouse Rosenthal, Little Pea is a bedtime story with a lot of charm. A bonus for one-child families: Little Pea offers a positive depiction of the only-child-parent bond. ( )

Clever idea for a story...and well-executed! The text is concise, and the illustrations are adorable. However, we're going to try to avoid the eat-your-supper-and-get-dessert thing with our children because we believe that rule made us develop some not-so-healthy habits with dessert. So seeing as how that's the crux of this story, I don't foresee us purchasing this book or getting it from the library again. But that's just our own personal hang-up with it. It really is a great little story! ( )

Little Pea can't have spinach for dessert until he eats all his candy. Cute! Shows that whatever is held out as a reward is what we're gonna want. ( )

Little Pea is about a pea whose parents make him eat all his candy before he is allowed to eat vegetables for dessert. This “reverse psychology” story works because both it and the spare yet expressive illustrations by Jen Corace are so charming. Kids will laugh knowingly at little pea’s predicament and root him on as he has to eat all that “yucky” candy. ( )

I love this story: I wish I could be little pea so I could eat all of his candy. ( )

Little pea is just your average kid-pea. And furthermore, he does NOT like to eat his candy, because that's what he has to eat everyday - candy, candy, candy. He much prefers dessert, and can only have it after he's eaten every single bit of candy on his plate. He can't wait to see what his dessert is - Hurray! It's spinach!

A simple story, minimal illustrations, funny to see life from a pea's point of view. And little pea and his parents live happ-pea-ly ever after. ( )