Food puns may not be forgivable, but this book makes a surprisingly strong defense.
A pun is almost always dangerous.
Nearly every name in this picture book populated by breads (both raised and flat) is a play on words. Some of them will make readers feel clever. The main character is Alfie Koman, and his best friend is Challah Looyah, which will amuse anyone who loves Jewish holiday food. Classmates Naan-cy and Cornelius Tortilla provide additional overt ethnic diversity but maybe not many chuckles, and naming a charred piece of bread Burnie Toast is questionable at best. The class bully is called Loaf, which is barely a joke at all. The visual humor is more successful. The talking challah, for example, has braided hair. It seems very apt—whether it’s meant as a joke or not—that Loaf is shaped like the tablets that contain the Ten Commandments. (In the pictures, Moses and most of the Israelites are depicted as human and appear to be White.) Alfie spends most of the book trying to tell the Passover story to his classmates, but Loaf keeps interrupting. This leads to some wonderfully stupid jokes. The ruler of Egypt, Loaf says, is a giant insect named Pha-Roach, and according to him, the 10 plagues include “Birthday Clowns” and “Indoor Recess Forever.” The book turns briefly serious when Alfie finally stands up to the bully (yelling, “LET MY STORY GO!”) and tells “the REAL Passover story.” This leads to an inspiring moral about bravery and friendship, but many readers won’t mind the lesson, because it’s both genuinely moving and a relief from the puns. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10.5-by-19-inch double-page spreads viewed at 90.2% of actual size.)
Food puns may not be forgivable, but this book makes a surprisingly strong defense. (glossary) (Picture book. 3-8)Pub Date: March 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-11811-5
Page Count: 36
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Cookie-cutter predictability.
After all the daring escapes in the How To Catch… series, will the kids be able to catch Santa?
Oddly, previous installments saw the children trying (and failing) to catch an elf and a reindeer, but both are easily captured in this story. Santa, however, is slippery. Tempted but not fooled by poinsettias, a good book (attached to a slingshot armed with a teddy bear projectile), and, of course, milk and cookies, Santa foils every plan. The hero in a red suit has a job to do. Presents must be placed, and lists must be checked. He has no time for traps and foolery (except if you’re the elf, who falls for every one of them). Luckily, Santa helps the little rascal escape each time. Little is new here—the kids resort to similar snares found in previous works: netting, lures, and technological wonders such as the Santa Catcher 5000. Although the rhythm falters quite a bit (“How did we get out you ask? / It looked like we were done for. / Santa’s magic is very real, / and I cannot reveal more”), fans of the series may not mind. Santa and Christmas just might be enough to overcome the flaws. Santa and the elf are light-skinned, one of the children is brown-skinned, and the other presents as Asian. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Cookie-cutter predictability. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2023
ISBN: 9781728274270
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Not enough tricks to make this a treat.
Another holiday title (How To Catch the Easter Bunny by Adam Wallace, illustrated by Elkerton, 2017) sticks to the popular series’ formula.
Rhyming four-line verses describe seven intrepid trick-or-treaters’ efforts to capture the witch haunting their Halloween. Rhyming roadblocks with toolbox is an acceptable stretch, but too often too many words or syllables in the lines throw off the cadence. Children familiar with earlier titles will recognize the traps set by the costume-clad kids—a pulley and box snare, a “Tunnel of Tricks.” Eventually they accept her invitation to “floss, bump, and boogie,” concluding “the dance party had hit the finale at last, / each dancing monster started to cheer! / There’s no doubt about it, we have to admit: / This witch threw the party of the year!” The kids are diverse, and their costumes are fanciful rather than scary—a unicorn, a dragon, a scarecrow, a red-haired child in a lab coat and bow tie, a wizard, and two space creatures. The monsters, goblins, ghosts, and jack-o'-lanterns, backgrounded by a turquoise and purple night sky, are sufficiently eerie. Still, there isn’t enough originality here to entice any but the most ardent fans of Halloween or the series. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Not enough tricks to make this a treat. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-72821-035-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: May 10, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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