Best known for his role in the TV series New Girl, debut author Max Greenfield joins forces with illustrator Mike Lowery (Everything Awesome series) in this hilarious picture book tribute to reluctant readers.
"I don't want to read this book," the unseen narrator declares in childish lettering on the otherwise blank first page. They subsequently delineate their objections in a panoply of fun-for-the-eyes lettering styles across a series of exuberant, colorful layouts. First, they worry the book may have a lot of words, as demonstrated by the word "words" repeated in a range of lettering styles across a full spread. Worse, many books have sentences, also known as "too many words all smushed together." Paragraphs are an even greater threat. "I would love to meet a person who is able to read a full paragraph and not lose their train of thought," the narrator says, the last three words written on a drawing of a train with an uncoupled caboose. Their worries become self-fulfilling prophecies as the monologue turns from words into sentences, paragraphs and a dreaded chapter heading until the narrator realizes they've inadvertently read the entire book.
Greenfield's irreverent text demolishes the fourth wall, and Lowery's peppy pencil and digital-media renderings of his words have a vibe reminiscent of a child's journal, with doodle-style drawings accenting his dynamic renditions of Greenfield's words. For avid and reluctant readers alike, this tongue-in-cheek, metafictive send-up of reading as a chore is delightfully unlikely to live up to its title. --Jaclyn Fulwood, youth experience manager, Dayton Metro Library