How to read a very serious book

Gr 1--4--Two readers are oh-so-serious about their reading and want to make sure everyone around them knows that. With perfect style and pomposity, two young people (a boy with dark skin and a girl with lighter skin) make quite a spectacle of their "serious" reading. An off-page narrator engages the two children in a discussion of their delight in reading such serious tomes. Small text, no pictures, and large books are the hallmark of a serious reader--or so readers of this book are led to believe. The narrator points out serious reading flair with the two children engaging in "pondering" faces and turning pages with flourish. As readers progress through the panels of dialogue and illustrations that capture the tongue-in-cheek humor, they will find boon companions in the stars of this book. By the end, the truth is revealed, and the children are found to be seriously enjoying graphic novels and so is the narrator. Addressing the topic of what counts as reading with a generous sense of fun amid the seriousness, this title will be very useful in classrooms and libraries hoping to engage all readers in whatever form of reading best suits them. VERDICT A meta look at the acts of reading, pretend, and finding a way to identity, this book works for children across a span of grade levels.

A playful dose of metafiction for the picture book set. Cartoon-style illustrations use wordless opening scenes to show two children (one is brown-skinned; the other presents Asian) reading books with plain gray covers. Then an offstage speaker interrupts to judge these books by their covers, deeming them "BORING and HO-HUM" and "VERY SERIOUS BOOKS!" The tone becomes congratulatory and subtly conspiratorial as the narrator encourages the children to find ways "to let EVERYONE ELSE know you are reading a very serious book." What follows is a humorous scene as the kids read the supposedly serious books in front of others while wearing mustaches, sporting glasses, sipping tea, and so on. When some rambunctious squirrels disrupt their picnic and send the books flying, illustrations reveal that these gray books have panels as in a graphic novel--much like the layout of this story's own spreads. The punchline seems to be that the children's books weren't so serious after all, though the sophistication of the interplay between text and art cleverly belies that message. A closing image positions the brown-skinned adult who joins the children and reads with them as the offstage speaker and reinforces the pleasures of reading illustrated books. Serious fun.(Picture book. 4-8) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.