The Very Inappropriate Word - Hardcover

Tobin, Jim

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0805094741 ISBN 13: 9780805094749

Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. (BYR), 2013

Synopsis

Michael loves interesting words (hard words like ELASTIC, little words like VAST, and big words like SMITHEREENS) and is always on the lookout for words to collect. Then one day, he picks up a new word. A bad word. An inappropriate word. At least, that's what his friend says. But Michael kind of likes the word. He thinks he might try it out.

At school.

Bad idea.

About this title

About the Authors

JIM TOBIN is an award-winning biographer and the author of The Very Inappropriate Word, Ernie Pyle’s War and To Conquer the Air. He lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

DAVE COVERLY is a nationally syndicated cartoonist whose Speed Bump cartoons appear in more than 200 newspapers, including The Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, and Parade magazine. He lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Reviews

K-Gr 2-Michael collects words. He enjoys finding new ones on signs, on TV, at baseball practice, and at school. The humorous ink and watercolor cartoon illustrations represent the words graphically-"sudsy" appears in a soap bubble, "slugger" on a baseball, etc., and help to illuminate their meanings. Michael happily collects the words until the day he hears a new one on the school bus. It is depicted as an angry-looking scribbled mess with symbols instead of letters. Michael picks up the word to add it to his collection. His older sister, however, says, "Michael! That is a very inappropriate word!" Unsure, he asks his friend what "inappropriate" means. When "Bad!" is the answer, Michael hides the word in his pocket. Suddenly aware, he hears it in more places. He cannot resist showing it to his friends at school. His kind teacher redirects him to the library and gives him the job of finding different new words. Using stacks of books with well-known titles, Michael happily gathers fascinating words such as "vibrato," "shenanigans," and "nimbus." His collection grows so large, he eventually loses track of the very inappropriate term. The only problem with this book will be in trying to keep children from sharing their own inappropriate words. For a fun storytime, pair this title with Audrey Wood's Elbert's Bad Word (Harcourt, 1988).-Lucinda Snyder Whitehurst, St. Christopher's School, Richmond, VAα(c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Michael is a word hound. He sees and hears words that he likes and collects them—literally—in a box under his bed. As illustrated by Coverly, these dialog bubbles are adorned with legs (scram), stretched wide (elastic), broken to pieces (smithereens), and more. One day on the school bus, Michael hears a large, hairy, green word—something akin to “@#*!” He is told it’s “inappropriate,” but “there is also something about it that he kind of likes.” Tobin’s depiction of the bad word literally being passed around from student to student is an inspired idea, and it does look rather fun ejecting that big green monstrosity out into the world. Michael gets caught, of course, but his clever teacher sics him on the school library in search of new spelling words, and once he has collected two wagon loads of cool new ones—nimbus, vibrato, putrid, dragster, aerodynamic—he loses track of good old @#*! Until, well, someone else digs it up. Exaggerated cartoony fun on a mostly untouched topic—it’s pretty @#*! good. Grades K-2. --Daniel Kraus

Edition details

• Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. (BYR)
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0805094741
• ISBN 13: 9780805094749
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: Coverly Dave
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 36