Rock Paper Incisors: A Skunk and Badger Story
by Amy Timberlake; illus. by Jon Klassen
Primary, Intermediate    Little, Brown    192 pp.
10/25    9781643750071    $18.99

Roommates Skunk and Badger (Skunk and Badger, rev. 1/21; Egg Marks the Spot) are now caring for two rat pups, Zeno and Zephyr. Badger, true to form, has exacting plans in mind (“Find the right routine and everything falls into place chunk, chunk, chunk”) and balks when the less-structured reality sets in. Rats, it turns out, don’t sleep at night, and in fact that’s when they get their most innovatively disruptive ideas (e.g., dental-floss ziplines). Meanwhile, a deadline looms for Badger’s latest Rock Hound Weekly article, and though the more easygoing Skunk tries his darndest to be helpful, Badger’s procrastination is compounded by the chaos…and then by his own natural sleep cycle. The third-person narration, which sticks to Badger’s point of view, again uses sophisticated vocabulary and sentence structure, providing a challenge for readers who’ve cut their teeth on simpler mismatched-friend stories. “Who knew you could not say ‘goodnight,’ close the door, and expect Zeno and Zephyr to utilize their bunk beds?” But that challenge comes with plenty of humor, and many readers will likely recognize themselves or others they know in Badger’s difficulty in dealing with the unexpected. Black-and-white illustrations with an old-fashioned feel are occasionally interspersed, some with captions from the text; one showing the kitchen crisscrossed with string and captioned “a room webbed” is a highlight.

From the November/December 2025 issue of The Horn Book Magazine.