Robot Zot does not fall. Robot Zot conquers all. He lands on Earth to conquer all, but never realizes that he is only three inches tall. He conquers the earthlings anyhow. At least the earthling kitchen appliances, TV, and vacuum cleaner. And then Zot falls in love.
This is what happened to Jon Scieszka. He grew up with five brothers. No sisters. His dad called all of the guys Knuckleheads. A deeply researched autobiography, illustrated with goods from Jon's scrapbook.
You may think you know the story of the Three Little Pigs. But you don't know the whole story until you've heard A. Wolf's side of the story. Mr. Wolf huffs, and he puffs, and he has a very bad sneezing cold. He also needs a cup of sugar to make a birthday cake for his dear, sweet granny's birthday. Read and learn. Then decide for yourself--Big Bad Wolf . . . or media frame-up?
This is the story of what happened after "They lived happily ever after." What happens is: a witch, a spell, a poison apple, another witch, a gingerbread house with an extra large oven, dragonfly wallpaper, a Fairy Godmother, a pumpkin, a carriage, another spell, a clock striking midnight, a kiss, frogs, and true love.
What if the little old lady and the little old man who make the Gingerbread Man ran out of gingerbread? They might make a little man out of stinky cheese. And their fairy tale might never be the same again. What if someone changed a whole bunch of fairy tales? Those tales might become: The Princess and the Bowling Ball, Little Red Running Shorts, and The Really Ugly Duckling. And the whole book might be called The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales.
This is a Book that squashes a Man that stomps a Bug that frays a Rug that trips a Hatter that knocks an Egg that startles a Pieman that flings a Pie that beans a Baby that tosses a Cow that spooks a Dog that chases a Cat that eats a Rat that falls in a Picture in A Book That Jack Wrote. Quantum physics explained in an oil-painting nursery rhyme.
On Monday in math class, Mrs. Fibonacci says, "You know, you can think of almost everything as a math problem." After that, everything turns into a math problem. The number of kids on the bus, fractions for lunch, word problems for English class. It's a math nightmare, until our narrator figures out how to break the Math Curse. Then everything is just fine . . . until science class.
If you ever wanted to gossip about your friends, this is how you do it. Like Aesop did. Change the people into animals, add a moral, and presto. Now your stories aren't rude gossip and bad jokes. They are fables. Enjoy these thinly disguised stories of Elephant and Mosquito, Straw and Matches, Piece of Toast and Froot Loops, and Duckbilled Platypus vs. BeefSnakStik. The moral of the stories? If you can't say something nice about someone, change their name to Donkey or Squid.
Henry P. Baloney is from another planet. And he's late (again) for class. If he doesn't come up with a very good excuse, he's in for Permanent Lifelong Detention. This is Henry's excuse. And it's a good one all right. It starts with Henry's missing zimulis, takes off like a razzo, buzzes around in a sighing flosser, and ends up back in szkola. A real intergalactic tall tale . . . in many languages.
On Wednesday in science class, Mr. Newton says, "You know, if you listen closely enough, you can hear the poetry of science in everything." After that, everything turns into a science poem. Our narrator staggers through scientific parodies of famous poems and rhymes from "I've been working on the Food Chain" to "Mary Had a Little Worm". Edgar Allan Poe, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Julia Ward Howe, Clement Clarke Moore, Lewis Carroll, and Robert Frost had nothing to do with this.
A little guy is supposed to meet his friend Art at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Fifty-third street in New York City. Art's not there. So our guy asks a lady walking by, "Have you seen Art?" She directs him to the newly redesigned Museum of Modern Art where everyone is more than happy to show him where they have seen Art. Van Gogh, Matisse, Miro, DeKooning, Monet, Picasso, and 54 other artists helped Lane Smith illustrate this accidental tour of the new MoMA.
