Just…don’t.
Silly, rhyming euphemisms to jazz up powder-room humor.
Matejek-Morris shows remarkable wordsmithing skill in his laugh-out-loud lines of text. The narrator is depicted as a child who opens the book with a warning: “There are nice words like puppy and buttercup and snickerdoodle, and there are rude words.” To help readers avoid saying rude words, the child then delivers a torrent of tongue-twisting, rhyming euphemisms for poop, pee, burp, belch, butt, boogers, and farts. For the titular rude word, for instance, readers could substitute “humdrum bum crumbs, / float-or-sinker, / major stinker, / sometimes mushy from your tushy, / smelly belly funky jelly.” It all culminates in a cumulative barrage of words that readers will be hard-pressed to say without dissolving into giggles—unless they are distracted and dismayed by some truly unfortunate visual characterization. The protagonist is depicted as a brown-skinned person with black, curly hair. Color associations in the cover art and some interior pages may cause the eye to link the shade of the character’s skin with the anthropomorphized turds that appear along with the aforementioned euphemisms. If that weren’t bad enough, when the cumulative text arrives, it’s presented as a grinning (and farting, urinating, defecating, belching, nose-picking) tap-dancing spectacle that evokes caricatures of minstrelsy. (This book was reviewed digitally with 8-by-14-inch double-page spreads viewed at 50.1% of actual size.)
Just…don’t. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-358-42333-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Nothing new here but a nonetheless congenial matriculant in publishing’s autumnal rite of back-to-school offerings.
The Crayons head back to class in this latest series entry.
Daywalt’s expository text lays out the basics as various Crayons wave goodbye to the beach, choose a first-day outfit, greet old friends, and make new ones. As in previous outings, the perennially droll illustrations and hand-lettered Crayon-speak drive the humor. The ever wrapperless Peach, opining, “What am I going to wear?” surveys three options: top hat and tails, a chef’s toque and apron, and a Santa suit. New friends Chunky Toddler Crayon (who’s missing a bite-sized bit of their blue point) and Husky Toddler Crayon speculate excitedly on their common last name: “I wonder if we’re related!” White Crayon, all but disappearing against the page’s copious white space, sits cross-legged reading a copy of H.G. Wells’ The Invisible Man. And Yellow and Orange, notable for their previous existential argument about the color of the sun, find agreement in science class: Jupiter, clearly, is yellow AND orange. Everybody’s excited about art class—“Even if they make a mess. Actually…ESPECIALLY if they make a mess!” Here, a spread of crayoned doodles of butterflies, hearts, and stars is followed by one with fulsome scribbles. Fans of previous outings will spot cameos from Glow in the Dark and yellow-caped Esteban (the Crayon formerly known as Pea Green). (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Nothing new here but a nonetheless congenial matriculant in publishing’s autumnal rite of back-to-school offerings. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: May 16, 2023
ISBN: 9780593621110
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: Feb. 24, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Let these crayons go back into their box.
The Crayons return to celebrate Easter.
Six crayons (Red, Orange, Yellow, Esteban, who is green and wears a yellow cape, White, and Blue) each take a shape and scribble designs on it. Purple, perplexed and almost angry, keeps asking why no one is creating an egg, but the six friends have a great idea. They take the circle decorated with red shapes, the square adorned with orange squiggles “the color of the sun,” the triangle with yellow designs, also “the color of the sun” (a bit repetitious), a rectangle with green wavy lines, a white star, about which Purple remarks: “DID you even color it?” and a rhombus covered with blue markings and slap the shapes onto a big, light-brown egg. Then the conversation turns to hiding the large object in plain sight. The joke doesn’t really work, the shapes are not clear enough for a concept book, and though colors are delineated, it’s not a very original color book. There’s a bit of clever repartee. When Purple observe that Esteban’s green rectangle isn’t an egg, Esteban responds, “No, but MY GOSH LOOK how magnificent it is!” Still, that won’t save this lackluster book, which barely scratches the surface of Easter, whether secular or religious. The multimedia illustrations, done in the same style as the other series entries, are always fun, but perhaps it’s time to retire these anthropomorphic coloring implements. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Let these crayons go back into their box. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-62105-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: Oct. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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