Chris Young reviewed Little Monster's Word Book by Mercer Mayer
Review of "Little Monster's Word Book" on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
It's a book of words. I'm undecided as to whether it is supposed to be educational, a cursory glance would suggest it is, but closer inspection would question some of the words.
For instance, inside the front cover the alphabet is spelt out. You'd expect "Apple, Ball, Cat (or whatever)", but no - this book has Angry Anchovy, Kicking Kerploppus and a Very Vain Vampire! (I think the people making up the Ubuntu release names need a copy of this book)
The rest of the book is themed per page. There's a page of drawings (or one big drawing) with things of interest labelled. The first spread is Music and features a marching band, rock and roll band, country and western band and... a washtub band. The instruments are labelled as to what they are ("saw", "comb and tissue paper", "washboard" and "washtub bass" in the latter-named band). There's a …
It's a book of words. I'm undecided as to whether it is supposed to be educational, a cursory glance would suggest it is, but closer inspection would question some of the words.
For instance, inside the front cover the alphabet is spelt out. You'd expect "Apple, Ball, Cat (or whatever)", but no - this book has Angry Anchovy, Kicking Kerploppus and a Very Vain Vampire! (I think the people making up the Ubuntu release names need a copy of this book)
The rest of the book is themed per page. There's a page of drawings (or one big drawing) with things of interest labelled. The first spread is Music and features a marching band, rock and roll band, country and western band and... a washtub band. The instruments are labelled as to what they are ("saw", "comb and tissue paper", "washboard" and "washtub bass" in the latter-named band). There's a monster hiding in the tuba. There is humour throughout, partly in the great drawings, and partly in the labels. The County Fair page contains a "weight-guessing trollusk". On the pets page, the lion is labelled "big kitty cat". There's a pet shoe. Ways to Travel that are suggested include "UFO", "use your wings" and "rubber horse" alongside more traditional modes of transport.
This book made me giggle when I was young, and I kept hold of it although I'm not entirely sure how it survived all these years (although I was worried I'd lost it a while back). It's still raising a smile now and I've lost count of how many times I've read it.
It is, unquestionably, the best book of words I've ever seen/read.