NOBODY LIKES FROGS

Persnickety Q. Turtle disdains your choice of book and lists all the ways frogs are completely disgusting.

The book continues the format begun on the cover, with the turtle breaking the fourth wall of a real book about frogs. The illustrations are a fascinating mix of the rather simplistically drawn cartoon turtle and their speech bubbles and the realistic illustrations in the frame book and the text that responds to the turtle’s complaints about frogs: They are always burping (that’s croaking), their ballet moves are “an insult to the art form” (leaping is how they get around), their skin is proof of their bad hygiene (but actually helps them hydrate and breathe), and they are always rudely staring with their bug eyes (which help them see their prey and swallow it down). In the end, the turtle remains unconvinced that frogs have any redeeming qualities despite a cartoon frog’s rescuing them from all the flies that have gathered with the page turns. That frog’s final burp seals the deal, though they do say “Excuse me.” Lists of frog facts and ways to help frogs round out the book. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

These frog facts go down as easily as the flies frogs catch.