This frenetic parody of “A Visit from St. Nicholas” uses a mad-dinosaur theme, with a wild T-Rex and his team of dinosaurs arriving at a snow-covered house to steal the presents and dine on the residents. The narrating father is swallowed by the T-Rex Santa imposter and meets the real Santa in the dinosaur’s stomach, and together they escape and fight off the dinosaurs with the help of the little boy of the house and his magical “video gun.” Watercolor illustrations depict the marauding dinosaurs and fleeing Santa, with lots of chase scenes, flashes of sharp dino teeth and curls of sparkly green gunsmoke. The text offers dino-drama, but purists will cringe at mangled meter and near-miss rhyming word pairs. Many young readers will love this, and many adults will not. (Picture book. 4-7)
