Beautiful and Billiant If you know Tony Millionaire's adult comic, Maakies, you might think that he would write an ironic children's book. This is not the case. Tony Millionaire has a soft side and it's beautiful. This book is absolutely OK for kids. Some of the deeper text might go over the head of a child and even the adult reading to the child, but the pictures and story won't loose their interest.
This book will be remembered as a peer amongst the likes the Wizard of Oz and Alice in Wonderland. The drawings are astounding. The story is beautiful.
Nothing is safe, nothing is canon. Oh man. This is a really weird book. Even by Tony Millionaire standards, this is a really weird book. I bought it for my daughter after getting her most of the other Sock Monkey books. But I haven't read it to her yet on account of being too freaked out by the metaphysical weirdness to take another look at it. I'm sure she will deal with it just fine. It's me that I'm worried about.
Suffice to say that the whole Sock Monkey world is not what we thought it was. Nothing is safe. Nothing is sacred. Nothing is canon. The message of this book appears to be that all you really have for certain is what is right in front of you and the experience at this present moment. Memories could be false or mistaken. The future is totally unknown and potentially disasterous. But look, there's the moon.
Most kids can handle this book, I think. It's the parents who will walk away from the bedside with jaw hanging slack and their eyes wide open.
I'm giving this 5 stars despite being afraid to pick up the book again. Any children's book that prompts this kind of serious thought using pictures of a sock monkey riding around in a cart pulled by a pair of yorkies deserves all the stars that I can possibly give.perhaps the best sock monkey story yet... wow! tony millionaire sure knows how to pull the most wonderful surprises out of his hat. not that is surprising to find a cleverly written and brillantly illustrated book by him, but nonetheless, this book is something else. sad and poetic and utterly wistful, children of all ages, and particularly children who have suddenly discovered that they have mysteriously gotten older and things have changed, will find this book quite appealing (and maybe even disturbing, in a good way of course...) i would give this book 5 stars for the last page alone...what can i say...BUY IT!
