Monday, February 10, 2014

Little Monkey Calms Down, by Michael Dahl (illustrated by Oriol Vidal)

Little Monkey Calms Down
Author: Michael Dahl
Illustrator: Oriol Vidal
Series: Hello Genius
Publisher: Capstone Young Readers/ Picture Window Books
Publication Date: February 1, 2014
View on Amazon

Source: NetGalley

Wait, what? After I read this picture book with my daughter I felt I must have missed something. The monkey in the book is about to have a tantrum because he drops his ice cream, but then he doesn't. That's about it. His ice cream is still all ruined at the end. That does not get resolved. I think Little Monkey is perfectly within his rights to be upset, thank-you very much. I'm not sure if it's a reasonable lesson to try to teach kids, "When something crappy happens, deal with it by not caring about that crappy thing. When you lose something you love, deal with it by not loving that thing anymore. Problem solved."


If anything this book made me feel less calm than I did before. I felt bad for the poor little monkey who lost his ice cream. Deep breaths and singing quiet songs can help you get enough control of yourself so you can then go deal with what's actually wrong. But nobody helps Little Monkey get a new ice cream. Or clean up the old ice cream. Or tell him that there will be more ice cream in the future. NOTHING!

Maybe it's just because I really like ice cream. I'm sure kids won't be bothered by this. Kids don't like ice cream, do they?


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