LITTLE BOO

With a bit of perspective, a ghost learns to accept a baby sibling.

Big Boo, who narrates, enjoys a blissful few early months with Little Boo, “a sweet and adorable baby.” Things are easy enough when Little Boo is too small to do much of anything; Little Boo listens as Big Boo talks, and Big Boo ferries the younger spirit around. Then comes the day when Little Boo learns to crawl, then float, and, at last, talk. Little Boo becomes an annoying, constant presence whose declarations of love are trying. Big Boo’s werewolf friend Howl, on the other hand, has a sibling who seems enviably calm (and who shares Big Boo’s love of literature). Howl points out that “Little Howl is a little monster,” but Big Boo nevertheless accepts a sibling trade. Oops…what a mistake! Maybe Little Boo isn’t such a trial after all? The cute and relatable plot is only half the attraction. Readers will pore over countless details in the Boo household: the alligator chairs and dining table, Little Boo’s owl highchair and hollow-pumpkin bassinet, the snake chandelier, the Venus fly trap desk lamp, the bat bathmat, and the candy corn–chomping squirrels rapturously hailed by Little Boo as “Kitteez!!!” Graphic novel–esque panels and speech bubbles, as well as simple but frenzied linework, give Frost plenty of scope for clever comic effects to fuel rereading.

A hauntingly funny tale of family love.