PENCIL & ERASER

Do pencils have lives of their own? Yes, though at times they may seem pointless.

Shockingly, Pencil is dull. Not dull as in “uninteresting” but dull as in “needs sharpening.” Pencil dramatically imagines owner Stella (represented by a brown hand) rejecting such a useless writing implement. Eraser’s terse advice: “Sharpen up.” But how will they get from Stella’s classroom desk all the way to the sharpener on the teacher’s desk? Pencil (briefly sporting a fedora) narrates in the style of an old-fashioned adventure tale. Reserved, laconic Eraser finds the voluble and excited Pencil a bit overwhelming, and, faced with Pencil’s multi-step plan, Eraser rubs it out in favor of a simpler idea: They’ll use the teacher’s chair to climb up (a scene that mostly occurs off the page). Alas! The sharpener is broken. After taking one of several groan-worthy joke breaks, they look for another sharpener. Once more, Pencil has plenty of far-fetched ideas, all of which Eraser dismisses. Will they ever find the coveted sharpener? Very simple drawings depict Pencil as tall and skinny, with fluttery eyelashes; short, stumpy Eraser is pink and white, with cynical half-lidded eyes. The faces are expressive and the typeface clear. While the tale’s a bit light on action, the duo’s comic interplay is sure to win over readers.

A tame adventure tale but a warm buddy story.