THE FATHER WHO HAD TEN CHILDREN

From Belgium, a kooky take on parenthood. As was the case with the old woman who lived in a shoe, a father has ten children and hardly knows what to do. Ten children mean ten of everything: ten breakfasts, ten pairs of underpants, ten t-shirts, ten jeans, not to mention twenty little socks and shoes. Every night he stays up late building a secret boat to sail around the world “all by himself . . . for ten days, or maybe even ten months.” After one day and night alone, he prepares his first solitary breakfast, automatically setting out ten cups, which makes him miss his children terribly. Soon after, father and his ten little mateys merrily set sail around the world. Large white backgrounds transform into a pleasingly turquoise sea as father sets sail; fat black outlines circumnavigate simple, round cheery shapes of the ten, wide-eyed, pink-faced cherubs, in a bright, refreshing style that shares a sensibility with Lucy Cousins’s art. The lone sailboat afloat in the ocean is a deliberate contrast to the clutter and confusion of life with ten children.(Picture book. 2-5)