Humorous Picture Books:
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Humorous picture books that make food fun
Three children's book reviews by P.J. Rooks
- How are you Peeling? Foods with Moods
- Dog Food
- Knock Knock
(P.J. blogs at Tell It Again Tales.)
Zany Fun for the Little One: Three Wacky Books featuring Saxton Freymann
Why say it with flowers when you could say it with fruit? The next time your kids are feeling the need to express themselves with food, you might steer them in the direction of Saxton Freymann, the wacky sculptor-at-large who prowls the farmer's markets of New York with an Exacto knife and a wild imagination.
Pouting peppers, outraged oranges, lonely lemons and rebel radishes fill the pages of this organic overview of emotions. What would make an orange mischievous? What do onions do when they cry? You’ll find all that and more with Saxton Freymann’s vegetables that never go bad -- well, at least not in the usual sense.
How are you Peeling? Foods with Moods was awarded the Best Illustrated Children's Book award by the New York Times Book Review back in 1999 when it first hit the shelves. A simple rhyme accompanies the text, though the faces of the fruits and veggies featured here are so uncannily clear in their expressions that it really isn't necessary to explain.
In his fruity creations, Freymann presents a play on words -- “dog catcher,” for example, depicts a green pepper-carved Dachshund catching a Frisbee and “dog show” has a broccoli poodle watching television with a couple of pals.
Though my daughter was thoroughly enchanted, I did have to explain some of the expressions, so, while the word play may add to the humor for slightly older kids, the younger ones will still delight in the many silly dog creations.
Other fun food books by Saxton Freymann include Fast Food, Food For Thought, Baby Food and Dr. Pompo’s Nose.
And speaking of Saxton Freymann, here’s another humorous picture book that’s sure to have your little one squirming with glee.
Knock, Knock! is a compilation of jokes by several different artists, starting with our vegetarian extraordinaire, Saxton Freymann.
The jokes -- and what kid doesn’t love knock, knock jokes? -- are accompanied by whimsical illustrations from each of the artists. Green aliens encounter multi-eyed extra-terrestrials, a little girl eats a whole cake and busts right through the seams of her skirt and a huge wildebeest sits down to dinner in a fine restaurant.
One of my favorites (by artist Chris Raschka) was --
Knock, knock!
Who’s there?
Verdi!
Verdi who?
Verdi vild tings are!”
Additionally, the showcasing of each artist’s style in Knock, Knock! might give some clues as to which children's book illustrators your child favors.
Who’s included and what have they done? The back of the book gives a quick introduction to each artist, but here, in a nutshell, are their names along with one of their other works:
Saxton Freymann -- see above
Jon J. Muth -- Stone Soup
Sophie Blackall -- Ruby’s Wish
Tomie dePaola -- Christmas Remembered
Boris Kulikov -- Max’s Words
Laurie Keller -- The Scrambled States of America
Chris Raschka -- The Hello, Goodbye Window
David Small -- Once Upon a Banana
Yumi Heo -- Uncle Peter’s Amazing Chinese Wedding
Judy Schachner -- Skippyjon Jones in Mummy Trouble
Brett Helquist -- A Series of Unfortunate Events
Henry Cole -- Naughty Little Monkeys
Peter H. Reynolds -- The Dot
Dan Yaccarino -- Zoom! Zoom! Zoom! I’m Off to the Moon!
Fun for the whole family, Foods with Moods, Dog Food and Knock, Knock! are sure to open the doors to joke-filled car rides and a fresh, new (and rather unusual) attitude about the produce aisle. In fact, check out all Saxton Freymann's humorous picture books
Read more of P.J.'s children's book reviews.
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