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Illustrated by Tony Fucile
Candlewick Press, 2010
$15.99, ages 4-8, 96 pages
Two pals get into spats, but discover that if they give a little, they can work things out in DiCamillo and McGee's adorable 2011 Theodor Seuss Geisel Award winner.
Bink and Gollie look nothing alike, but as they swap knowing glances on the cover of this early reader, you get the feeling they're alike where it really counts.
Though Bink is short and Gollie is tall, and their clothes and hair-dos are very different, each girl is adventurous and gets what the other is about.
Bink, with her flyaway hair, jumps into life, unconcerned with what others think, and it's that confidence that immediately endears her to us.
Gollie is reserved, but strong-willed. She longs for speed and spurs the two to roller-skate as fast as they can. She also imagines doing thrilling things, though she never goes far from her tree house.
Most of the time Gollie and Bink are game for what the other wants to do, but sometimes they're stubborn and won't budge enough to compromise.
Over three spare, energy-filled chapters, we see how a tiff between Bink and Gollie can blow up into an argument that neither really wants to have and can hide something else that's bothering one of them.
In the first chapter, Bink decides she has to get rainbow socks, and though Gollie thinks they're atrocious, she follows her on roller-skates to the five-and-dime and sticks by while Bink rummages through a bin.
But you can tell that the socks are really bugging Gollie. So when Bink asks Gollie on the way home if she'll whip up her classic pancake stack, Gollie gets persnickety and tells Bink she has to lose the socks first.
Bink, however, is not about give up her socks. She thinks Gollie's compromise is far from fair. So she calls Gollie's bluff and walks out her tree house with her socks proudly pulled up to her knees.