Dolittle Caravan/Dds

Ahh, the feelings of nostalgia I get when I think of Dr. Dolittle, the man who could talk to the animals. In the fifth grade all I did was read Dr. Dolittle books. My school library only had the Story of Dr. Dolittle, Dr. Dolittle's Voyages, Dr. Dolittle's Post Office, and Doctor Dolittle's Circus, and I always had one of them checked out. Consequently, I got sick of them. Then came summer vacation, and my downtown public library had Dr. Dolittle's Caravan. Well, I read it and really got into it. The story ties in with both the aforementioned Dr. Dolittle's Circus as well as Dr. Dolittle and the Green Canary (to the point that read Green Canary borders on redundancy, but I digress). Herein Dr. Dolittle discovers the canary with her sweet songs and bittersweet life's story. My favorite part occurs where the good doctor meets Paganini, the infamous violinist. I liked the "flirting with historical fiction" Lofting tosses our direction. Chronologically, this story MUST take place before 1839, the year the Dr. meets Tommy Stubbins; Paganini died in 1837, I believe, so the timeline for this novel would be the mid-1830s (assuming Dr. Dolittle was taught the language of animals around 1830). I hope this book goes back in print soon.