Best known as one of the directors of the 2014 Academy Award-nominated film Ernest and Celestine, French animator Benjamin Renner makes his American graphic novel debut with this comedy about a scraggly, underfed fox whose meal plans go hilariously awry.
Though he fancies himself "The Big Bad Fox," Renner's hero is more deserving of the title "worst fox ever." The unmotivated farm dog gripes at him for not cleaning up after himself, and the farm's pig and rabbit set aside baskets of turnips for him to eat when the tasty-looking hen chases him away. Disgruntled by the disrespect and his vegetarian diet, the fox hatches a plot with the truly terrifying wolf to steal the hen's eggs and eat the chicks when they hatch. The scheme founders when the three emerging chicks see the fox as their mother. The wolf directs the fox to fatten them up, but as the chicks grow from fluffballs into smart-mouthed preschoolers who think they're foxes, their reluctant "mommy" finds himself and the vicious wolf at odds over their fate.
Renner's forest-toned watercolor-and-ink scenes are placed elegantly against a pure white background, and Joe Johnson's translation of the dialogue flows perfectly. The humor often takes an adult approach by playing off stock parental experiences like sleepless nights and endless questions, but Renner adds plenty of kid-friendly slapstick and absurdity, including an army of fox-crushing hens and the least convincing chicken costume imaginable. Young readers and their parents will chuckle at this family-friendly rib-tickler, which is forthcoming as a film from Studiocanal in France. --Jaclyn Fulwood, youth services manager at Main Branch, Dayton Metro Library (Ohio)