[ARC AND BOOK REVIEW] Lio: Making Friends by Mark Tatulli and Henry and the Hidden Treasure by B.C.R. Fegan

Title:  Lio: Making Friends

Author:  Mark Tatulli

Genre:  Horror / Comedy / Fantasy / Animals

Year Published:  2013

Year Read: 6/8/2017

Series: Lio

Publisher: Andrews McMeel Publishing, LLC

Source:  Library

Content Rating:  Ages 7+ (Dark Humor)

Buy or Add on:  Amazon  //  Goodreads

What is this story about?

Check out more adventures of Lio and his spooky friends in this graphic novel series as Lio gets into more hilarious and creepy situations such as sending a “thank you” note to the Grim Reaper, trying to attract the attention of his love interest, a girl who constantly beats him up, receiving a birthday cake that explodes on impact and taking Godzilla to Tokyo!

What I loved about this story:

After I had read the previous volume “There’s a Monster in my Socks,” I wanted to check out more of Mark Tatulli’s hilarious and creepy “Lio” series and I was certainly not disappointed with this installment!  I loved the way that Mark Tatulli manages to weave both horror and comedy into this volume as I found myself laughing at some of the situations that Lio gets himself into, especially the “exploding birthday cake” scene which I found to be the funniest strip in this volume!   Mark Tatulli’s artwork helps narrate the stories in this volume as this series does not have any text to narrate the stories and yet, the artwork itself tells the stories and bring out the punchlines of the dark jokes.  I also loved the appearance of Lio himself as he has blank eyes and slick hair and he really stands out from the monster characters he is constantly hanging out with as he looks adorable while the monster characters look creepy and goofy.

What made me feel uncomfortable about this story:

A bit of a warning for anyone who does not like dark humor; this volume contains some punchlines that might be too dark for some readers to handle such as a child being eaten by a shark when Lio holds a bobbing for apples game and Lio’s toy bunny eating up a bully.

Final Thoughts:

Overall, “Lio: Making Friends” is another fantastic read from Mark Tatulli’s legendary “Lio” series!

Title:  Henry and the Hidden Treasure

Author:  B.C.R. Fegan

Artist:  Lenny Wen

Genre:  Adventure / Imagination / Family / Monsters

Year Published: 2017

Year Read:  2017

Publisher: TaleBlade

Source:  eARC (Publisher)

Content Rating:  Ages 4+ (Nothing Objectionable)

Buy on:  Amazon  //  Book Depository

I would like to thank the publisher TaleBlade for providing me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

The story is about a young boy named Henry who has received some pocket money from his parents and he ends up hiding the pocket money in his little treasure chest, even though his parents keep telling him that he needs to put his money in the bank.  However, Henry has a small problem: he believes that his little sister Lucy is actually a sly ninja who is out to steal his treasure and Henry tries to think up of some schemes that will prevent Lucy from stealing his treasure!

Will Henry be successful in protecting his treasure from Lucy and what kind of tricks will Lucy pull from her sleeves?

Read this book to find out!

I was actually quite surprised that TaleBlade had offered me a free advanced review copy of this book as I was quite interested in checking out this cute little children’s book from the mind of B.C. R. Fegan!  B.C.R. Fegan has done a great job at writing this story as it focuses on Henry trying to protect his precious pocket money from his little sister Lucy and I loved the fact that this story tackles the importance of taking your parents’ advice if said advice is meant to help the child in the long run.  I also loved the fact that B.C.R. Fegan focused on the importance of the love shared between siblings as the story relates how Henry would distrust his little sister Lucy in terms of whether or not she would steal his money and I was quite interested in seeing how Henry would solve his dilemma with his little sister Lucy throughout the story.  Lenny Wen’s artwork is adorable to look at as the characters are drawn in a rounded and adorable way that made me smile inside!  I also loved the fact that Lenny Wen used watercolors to provide a luscious feel to the artwork and they really shine in the images of the monsters themselves, especially of the artwork of the large pink pig that would have helped Henry guard his treasure.

The reason why I took off half a point from the rating was because I felt that there was a bit of a plot hole in this story as I was curious about how Henry got his pocket money (I know it seems a bit odd to know about, but I wanted to know if Henry got his money from house chores or the like).  I also wanted to see more moments between Henry and Lucy when Henry is not busy imagining Lucy as a ninja most of the time, since I wanted to see the full extent of their relationship in the real world.

Overall, “Henry and the Hidden Treasure” is a truly cute book for children who want to learn the importance of taking good advice from parents and loving their siblings for all of their faults.  I would recommend this book to children ages four and up since there is nothing inappropriate in this book.