Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsSo Wholesome and Charming I Could Plotz
Reviewed in the United States on September 6, 2015
This is a cheerful review because I was quite taken by this book. That's a bit surprising, because experience suggests that most grandparent books are so Hallmark/Disney/Family-Values bland or tin-eared that they read like long form greeting cards. Not so here. This book has a puckish sense of humor and a bit of parenting wisdom behind it.
The twist, that the kid is babysitting the grandma, is clever and is a joke that even a younger child will get. Good start, but you still have to have a grandma and a grandchild who do real things. In this book the little jokes are telling and the interaction between grandma and child seem real and unforced. How they amuse each other and entertain and occupy themselves could be drawn from some ideal sleepover memories. From visits to the park to goofy crafts to leaving the light on for grandma at bedtime, this tale is fun, silly, and real, or at least what we wish were real. Heck, even grandma's grey hair looks good. (Although, there should probably be a section about "pretending" how hard it is to get up off the carpet.)
The drawing is colorful, energetic and engaging. "Fun" is pretty hard to draw, but Lee Wildish did a great job of drawing just enough to get across the idea. The layout of the text and pictures is broken up in a way that gets across the haphazard and sort of manic nature of a sleepover. There are lots of little jokes drawn in around the edges, (the dog's reaction to stuff may be the funniest part of the book), so this really does become a "picture book" worth looking at closely.
The bottom line is I'm not sure you could read this grandparent book together and not have a good time and a couple of chuckles. How nice is that?
