Toot travels far away to a wild jungle to see a fantastic plant- and comes back home with an illness. Some virus that turns him blue. Puddle and Opal hustle him off to bed and treat him with teas and consult various doctors but nothing helps Toot get better. Until Opal does some research of her own and finds out that a stinkhorn fungus growing locally in a huge old lilac thicket might do the trick. They collect it and brew it and Toot drinks it down- voila! All better.
I dunno- I used to really be thrilled by the Toot and Puddle books, but this one had a few things that put me slightly off. First, the title makes you assume the book would be about Puddle missing Toot while he’s gone (or Toot wishing Puddle was accompanying him on the trip)- like the very first book. But it wasn’t. More than half is about what happens when Toot gets back home. Then there’s the fact that another Toot and Puddle book is about one of the pigs (I forget which) being depressed, so he’s blue. And that book is all about how his friend is trying to cheer him up again. Having this book also where one of the pigs turns blue (but this time from a virus) was just odd. In fact when I was describing to my sister which one I read, she was all confused, and so was I! I think having some symptom other than a skin color change from the virus might have made things more distinct? If they need to be. Most readers this probably wouldn’t bother them in the slightest.
Completed on 7/19/24. Borrowed from my sister.
