THE PEPPERSTORM

A story pits rodents against pachyderms, with a spicy twist.

The elephants in this story have not been informed of the myth that their kind is afraid of mice. They “live a happy life in the jungle. They eat and they sleep without a care in the world.” Mice, on the other hand, do have troubles, namely, “giant elephant feet.” Humorous cartoon art with a 1960s aesthetic emphasizes size differences with scale and placement as the text explains that elephants “are always looking up” because they enjoy bird-watching and gazing at elevated scenery. This means they don’t look where they are going and run the risk of stomping on the poor mice—not to mention crushing them with falling piles of dung, described only as “a very unpleasant surprise” but unmistakably depicted in art. What’s a tiny mouse to do? They call on their “cousins the bats” to fly about and sprinkle the elephants with black pepper. The rationale (rather labored in its explanation) is that this will cause the elephants to sneeze, and their heads will drop when they do so, making them notice the mice. Ultimately, however, it seems that avoiding the discomfort of another threatened pepperstorm (or “tormenta de pimienta” in the original Spanish edition, which publishes simultaneously in the U.S.) is what motivates the elephants to take greater care around their mouse neighbors.

Unlikely to take readers by storm.