SKELLY & FEMUR
by Jimmy Pickering and illustrated by Jimmy Pickering
Skelly the skeleton girl, of the eponymous 2007 book, has lost her buttons. Her dog Femur has lost his bone. Her Venus flytraps have lost their spoons. The little ghoul-girl, hair in a bat-shaped bow, explores the house from bottom to top (with an unexplained diversion to the deep sea to investigate a sea monster’s lost anchor) and discovers that everyone has lost something. But in the attic? A mouse has used the purloined items to make an elaborate cheese machine. This flimsy excuse for a plot seems to exists only to support a series of elaborate, Tim Burton–esque tableaux. Kids may enjoy the baroque illustrations of this peculiar undead family, but they’re unlikely to ask for it more than once. (Picture book. 3-5)