There is something naturally poetic about the animal world, like it has a pulse under everything. Animals can be amusing without intending it, mysterious without any explanation, and surprisingly expressive even when they never speak a word. For children’s writers, they bring a near limitless landscape for imagination, and it’s there, between the facts and the feelings, that stories begin.
In The Puppy in Disguise, Daniel Silverhawk comes back to that landscape again with another entry in his Once Upon a Time poetry series, and he kind of invites readers a second time into a world where animals, language, and imagination all meet, even if no one is fully sure how.
This go-around, the title itself sets off the first unavoidable question, What exactly is the puppy disguised as? That spark of curiosity is the exact kind of invitation that tends to work so well in children’s books. Before the story even starts, young readers already have something to chew on, a wondering little thread that pulls them forward.
The Animal Kingdom Through a Poet’s Eyes
The Puppy in Disguise keeps Silverhawk’s interest in weaving animals into poetry, a pairing that fits younger readers particularly well.
Kids very often form a quick emotional bond with animals. Puppies especially feel like playfulness and companionship, and also a streak of mischief, curiosity, and that steady, unconditional affection that makes everything feel warmer.
Poetry then, in the meanwhile, lets familiar things become unfamiliar again, not with a lecture but through rhythm, images, humor, and language that leans into imagination.
When those pieces are put together, Silverhawk offers kids a chance to meet poetry not as some formal and intimidating thing, but as narrative that has its own little musical pull.
This matters. For a lot of young readers, books like The Puppy in Disguise might be their first real brush with poetic language.
A fun poem about a creature can quietly guide children toward rhythm, careful word choice, sound, imaginative thinking, and observation, without turning the whole moment into a “lesson”. Learning shows up through enjoyment.
The Appeal of Disguise
Disguise, as an idea, brings with it huge imaginative power. Kids get the joy of pretending that they are something else. Costumes, imaginary identities, make-believe games, and little transformations are a basic piece of childhood play. It just feels natural.
When you put a puppy into that same territory it becomes a nice mix of knowing and mysterious. A puppy is already unpredictable. When the puppy is pretending, or even just appearing to be something else, young readers get one more layer of discovery.
That setup also pushes careful noticing. Things can look confusing from a distance, yet remain familiar once you look closer. A disguise, it makes the reader slow down, hunt for clues, and find what is tucked away.
For children, that changes reading into involvement. They are not only receiving the story. They are invited to ask questions, and keep wondering.
Why Animal Poetry Matters
Some children’s books are built mainly to deliver information. Others focus on growing reading skills. Still others bring in moral lessons.
Poetry can do a lot of these things, but its greatest gift might be getting children to love language itself. It can make words rhyme. It can make words jump out, with a little surprise, or a sudden twist. It can build pictures, right there in the mind. And it can take the plain, everyday object and make it feel almost extraordinary, like a small miracle.
An animal a child has probably seen a hundred times can suddenly turn into the center of adventure, or humor, or mystery, or pure wonder. Suddenly the same old creature is not just there, it is doing something. It is becoming something else, through verse.
Silverhawk’s Once Upon a Time series looks like it is built on this exact kind of inventive possibility. He keeps returning to the animal kingdom, but he does not repeat himself in a boring way. Instead, he gives young readers familiar characters and scenes while also finding fresh ways to reimagine them, using language as the engine.
There is real value in that steady method. Young readers often want familiarity, even when they are craving novelty. When a style shows up again and again, or a series keeps the rhythm they recognize, it can feel like coming back to a world they already understand. Then, inside that comfort, they still discover something new.
A Book to Be Shared
Poetry for children usually works best when it is read aloud, with a voice that carries it, and time to let the lines land. The experience turns into something communal.
A parent can bring out rhythm and expression. A teacher can invite kids to anticipate words, or to talk about what they picture in their head. Young readers can recite their beloved passages and later start trying their own rhymes, and experiments that feel a bit daring.
That is why a book like The Puppy in Disguise can be useful beyond just independent reading. It can become a starting point, really.
What animal would you choose for a poem? What would your puppy dress itself as, if it had the chance? If you could become an animal for one day, which creature would you pick?
All at once, one little book can nudge you toward drawing, storytelling, pretend play and children’s own attempts at poetry. That is one of the quiet strengths in easily accessible children’s literature: the last page does not always have to be the final moment of the experience.
Celebrating Curiosity
At its core, The Puppy in Disguise belongs to a tradition of children’s writing that treats curiosity as a thing worth guarding, and keeping safe.
Adults get accustomed to the world, you know. Children investigate it differently. A puppy is not merely a puppy. It can turn into a character, a mystery, a friend, or something entirely unexpected. The everyday becomes a doorway into imagination, somehow.
Silverhawk’s return to animals recognizes that instinct, and also that pull. Instead of asking for elaborate worlds or tangled mythology, children’s poetry can start with something familiar and invite the reader to see it another way.
That might sound simple. Good children’s writing often does. But making simplicity that still encourages imagination, that’s its own kind of skill.
The Verdict
Daniel Silverhawk’s The Puppy in Disguise is a playful addition to his Once Upon a Time poetry series, bringing young readers back to the animal kingdom, through imagination and verse.
Its appeal starts with a premise that grabs you right away, and it keeps going into the wider delights of children’s poetry: rhythm, curiosity, animals, language, and the pleased feeling of finding something a little unexpected tucked inside something familiar.
For parents and educators, this book gives a chance to bring poetry in a friendly, approachable way.
For children, it offers something even more essential: Permission to imagine.
In a world increasingly stuffed with screens, timetables, and tightly arranged activities, there is still tremendous worth in a book that just asks a child to wonder.
What is this puppy doing? What is it hiding? What could it become? And what adventure might be waiting under the disguise?
Sometimes a child’s lifelong relationship with books begins with a question that feels exactly like that.
Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Recommended for: young readers, families, classrooms, animal lovers, beginning poetry readers, and parents or educators looking for imaginative children’s literature that encourages curiosity and a love of language.