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Monday, February 8, 2010

A New Favorite

by Sally Lloyd-Jones, illustrated by Sue Heap
Random House
2009

First
of all, I have to say, I love this book, and if I could, I would marry it. It's ridiculously girly and has such a funny tongue-in-cheek humor. I enjoyed every bit of it, from the acrylic and crayon illustrations to the occasionally hand-lettered font to the heart and star-speckled endpages.

The unnamed blonde little diva who stars in this story involves a cast of characters including her baby sibling, some long-suffering neighborhood children, stuffed animals and the family pets in acting out her pretend wedding fantasy. Yes, this would be a fine book to share with youngsters who are getting ready to attend a family wedding as a flower girl or ring bearer. It does impart plenty of information about many nuptial traditions (sort of). But it also has a rampant sense of silliness that any four or five year old will appreciate. For example, her advice on snaring a mate is as follows, "BASICALLY, NO ONE WILL MARRY YOU IF: *You wear old pajamas and slippers in the middle of the day *You don't EVER take a bath *You don't EVER brush your hair and it looks like a bird's nest back there" For an engagement, she recommends, "Do your best curtsy or bow and kneel down and give them a golden ring or your favorite toy or a bite of your cookie. And that means you're allowed to get married." Invitations must be written in "beautiful Wedding Language."  Later, she pertly informs the reader that during the wedding you could wear a veil, or "a crown, a wig, some ears in case you're marrying a rabbit." Naturally, married people will "Live Happily Ever After THE END"

As you can see, I am having enormous difficulty not quoting the whole entire book.

Fans of Pinkalicious by Victoria and Elizabeth Kann or Fancy Nancy by Jane O'Connor and Robin Preiss Glasser will go nuts for this whimsical, romantic adventure.


I borrowed this book from the library.

2 comments:

  1. I don't know whether I'm cynical or just not into girly books, but I didn't particularly enjoy this title. I thought the tone was a bit too tongue-in-cheek for young ones to get.

    Have you shared this which a child yet? Does it work with them? My patrons just don't seem to connect to it as well as I thought they would when I ordered it. Maybe I just need to read it again. Wedding storytime, perhaps?

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  2. I have a friend with a very girly-girl 3-year-old who loves this book. I think you are right though... her mother and I chortle over some of the more tongue-in-cheek precious statements which go right over her daughter's head. The kid takes everything in the book pretty much at face value. In her mind: It has a princessy-bride in it. It has a pink cover. It is, therefore, good.

    I displayed this book around Valentine's and it circ'ed like mad.

    I don't think I'd use this for storytime, because of all the small details in the pictures and also because my storytime crowds tend to skew so very young.

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