BABY TO BIG

A vocabulary-building board book for children and adults.

On each spread of this board book, Fernandez (Baby to Brooklyn, 2017) juxtaposes illustrations of common infant vocabulary words with their adult counterparts. The word “crib,” for example, is represented both by a child peeking over the top of a crib and a large house with a trendy-looking family in the doorway, while “bottle” is both a baby bottle full of milk and a sweaty beer bottle. While the concept itself is clever and the colors are bold and appealing to young readers, it is unclear whether the book is aimed at children or their parents. Furthermore, many of the comparisons feel strained and out of place in a book that seems to want to be satiric. The word “bee,” for example, is not commonly found in such elementary vocabulary books, included more for the sake of the juxtaposition with Bey than any other reason. Other pages, such as the print of a woman’s rear end for the word “booty” (juxtaposed with “booties”) or a woman’s face for “babe” (“baby”), are in highly questionable taste. The illustrations lack imagination, at times resembling clip art.

Overall, the book is inappropriate for the typical board-book audience, and it lacks the dark wit found in more successful picture books aimed at adults.