IT'S GOING TO BE PERFECT!

Any parent and child can share the broad humor of this picture book with its reminiscence of a mother’s starry-eyed notion of having a baby. The text reads like a letter from a mother to a child. “Before you were born, I was so excited. I just knew everything was going to be perfect!” A smiling baby sleeps in an immaculate crib; a nattily attired, relaxed mom rocks the smiling babe. Stark reality sets in, revealed in subsequent pictures. The baby screams. The mother reports, “You spit up, and though I tried very hard, I didn’t know your every need.” The premise of the book is easy to grasp, and the humor is delightful, as are the jovial illustrations of a slightly plump, mostly overwhelmed mother. Children will appreciate seeing the effect they’ve had on their parents, and the differences between what might have been, and what is. (Picture book. 3-7)