[BOOK REVIEW] Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You? by Dr. Seuss

Title:  Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You?

Author:  Dr. Seuss

Genre:  Children's / Fantasy

Year Published: 1970

Year Read:  1994 (Re-Read: 2019)

Publisher:  Random House

Source:  Purchased

Content Rating:  Ages 3+  (Nothing Objectionable)

Buy on:  Amazon  //  Book Depository 

Man, Dr. Seuss sure did write a lot of children’s books!  Luckily, I was able to read so many of his books when I was little and they were always such a joy to read through!  But when I was little, some of his books managed to make it to these obscure little videos that I used to watch a lot and one of those books that I had watched on these videos was “Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You?”  I still cannot believe that I have not written a review for this book yet, but now I am!

“Oh, the wonderful things Mr. Brown can do!”

Mr. Brown can make sounds out of anything.  Like he can sound like a cow by going, “MOO! MOO!” And he can also sound like a bee by going “BUZZ! BUZZ”

Can you make various sounds like Mr. Brown can?

Oh man!  I just loved how Dr. Seuss is able to make a book about sounds be so creative and fun to read!  When I read this book as a child, I always had fun repeating the various sounds that Mr. Brown made, such as making buzzing sounds like a bee, making popping noises like a cork, making sounds like “DIBBLE DIBBLE DOPP DOPP” to represent the sound of rain falling and making noises like thunder and lightning.  Dr. Seuss’ artwork is as creative as ever as Mr. Brown is mostly clad in a brown outfit which goes well with his name.  I also loved seeing his facial expressions whenever he was making sounds, like having his eyes squint whenever he is making sounds that are hard to do, like a hippopotamus chew gum!

Overall, “Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You?” is a fantastic book for anyone who loves reading about sounds and loves reading Dr. Seuss books in general!  I would recommend this book to children ages three and up since there is nothing inappropriate in this book.

You might also like:

• Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are? by Dr. Seuss

• Oh, the Places You'll Go! by Dr. Seuss

• The Sneetches and Other Stories by Dr. Seuss

[BOOK REVIEW] There's a Wocket in my Pocket! by Dr. Seuss

Title:  There's a Wocket in my Pocket!

Author:  Dr. Seuss

Genre:  Children's / Fantasy

Year Published: 1974

Year Read:  2010

Publisher:  Beginner Books

Source:  Purchased

Content Rating:  Ages 4+  (One Scary Image)

Buy on:  Amazon  //  Book Depository 

“There’s a Wocket in my Pocket!” is truly a brilliant book from the creative mind of Dr. Seuss and it is about how a young boy tells the audience about the strange yet fun-loving creatures that live in a young boy’s house.  “There’s a Wocket in my Pocket!” is definitely one of the greatest books about rhyming ever written!

Dr. Seuss has done a splendid job at both writing and illustrating this book.  Dr. Seuss illustrations are truly great and creative as he illustrates the boy with a red outfit and spiky brown hair, which makes him a truly unique character in the book.  Also, the images of the creatures themselves are creative, especially of the images of the nupboards in the cupboards looking furry and yellow and have cotton ball shaped heads.  Dr. Seuss’ story is truly creative as the names that the boy gives to each creature is truly inventive as the names rhyme with various furniture that the creatures associate with such as the yeps on the steps and the vug under the rug.

“There’s a Wocket in my Pocket!” is a brilliant book that children will easily love for many years.  I would recommend this book to children ages four and up since the image of the vug under the rug might scare smaller children.

You might also like:

• Horton Hatches the Egg by Dr. Seuss

• The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss

• Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are? by Dr. Seuss

[BOOK REVIEW] And to Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street by Dr. Seuss

Title:  And to Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street

Author:  Dr. Seuss

Genre:  Children's / Fantasy

Year Published: 1937

Year Read:  2019

Publisher:  Vanguard Press, Inc.   

Source:  Purchased

Content Rating:  Ages 5+  (One Offensive Image)

Buy on: Amazon  //  Book Depository

I have been reading Dr. Seuss’s works ever since I was a child (it is pretty much a requirement as a child to read a Dr. Seuss book). So of course, I still have not read all of Dr. Seuss’s works and one of the books that I had owned ever since I was little, but I never really read was “And to Think that I Saw it On Mulberry Street!”  I only picked up this book after all of these years when some of my Goodreads friends had recommended it to me and I must say that it was quite a decent beginning for Dr. Seuss’s early works.

The story starts off with Marco’s father telling Marco to keep his eyelids up and see the things he can see on the street.  So, when Marco walked down Mulberry Street, he noticed a horse pulling a broken-down wagon down the street.  Marco thought that this sight was too boring and he started to imagine seeing more lavish decorations to the horse and wagon such as imagining it as a chariot being pulled by a reindeer or a sleigh being pulled by a large blue elephant with a Rajah riding on the elephant.

I have been reading many of Dr. Seuss’s works ever since I was a child and this book just happened to pass under the radar for me at the time.  It is amazing in seeing how Dr. Seuss’s earlier works differs heavily from his later works (for one thing, Dr. Seuss’s earlier works are a lot wordier than his later works).  So, of course I was a bit curious about seeing how this early work of Dr. Seuss’s would turn out and I ended up being quite interested in the subtle yet creative storytelling of this book!  Dr. Seuss had done a great job at writing this story as the story explores how far Marco’s imagination can go and teaches the reader about the beauty of having a vivid imagination. I loved the scenes of Marco using his imagination to make the sight of Mulberry Street much more interesting as it made the scenes much more entertaining to look at.  I especially loved the scenes of Marco imagining a musical band being pulled by a blue elephant as it was such a creative sight to see!

The reason why I took off half a point from the rating was because while the story was quite creative, I do not think that this book was as memorable as some of Dr. Seuss’s later works.  For one thing, the writing is much lengthier than most of Dr. Seuss’s works and that can make this book a bit of chore to read through. Also, this book does not have Dr. Seuss’s signature odd creatures that usually appear in his books (with the exception of the blue elephant).  There is also a controversial image in this book of a Chinese boy being shown as an offensive stereotype of Asians that might offend some people (although this book was written during the 1930s).

Overall, “And to Think that I Saw it on Mulberry Street” is a great introduction to Dr. Seuss’s earlier works and would be a great read for children who are huge fans of Dr. Seuss’s works!  I would recommend this book to children ages five and up since the portrayal of the Chinese boy might offend some people.

You might also like:

• The King's Stilts by Dr. Seuss

• The Lorax by Dr. Seuss

• Yertle the Turtle and Other Stories by Dr. Seuss

[ARC REVIEW] Diary of a Monster by Valeria Davila

Title:  Diary of a Monster

Author:  Valeria Davila

Artist:  Laura Aguerrebehere

Genre:  Children's / Humor / Monsters

Year Published: 2018

Year Read:  2018

Publisher:  Crackboom!

Source:   eARC (NetGalley)

Content Rating:  Ages 5+ (Some Gross Humor)

Buy on:  Amazon  //  Book Depository 

I would like to thank NetGalley and Crackboom! for providing me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

After reading “Diary of an Ogre,” I was actually surprised that there were several companion novels to the “Dear Diary” series and I was so excited to check out the newest book in the series “Diary of a Monster!”

The book explores about what life for a monster is like as we get to see the world through a monster’s point of view.  The titular monster in the story writes in his diary about the various things that he does as a monster such as terrifying the people he comes across, being one of the smelliest beings among his fellow monsters and eating worm cakes and mosquitoes!

Wow! Valeria Davila has done it again with writing this series in such a hilarious and creative way!  I loved the way that Valeria Davila explored the world through a monster’s point of view and we get to see what kind of activities the monsters do and how they feel about doing these activities.  I also loved the fact that the titular monster in this book is actually proud of being a monster, despite all the disgusting things that he does throughout the book such as being the smelliest monster around and eating mosquitoes and worm cakes.  It shows that the message of this book is being yourself, no matter how strange or frightening you might look towards other people.  Laura Aguerrebehere’s artwork is as usual humorous and fun to look at as we get to see the monster’s activities in all its disgusting glory!  I especially loved the images of the monster scaring off the tourists on an island and the green stink clouds that surround the monster to indicate how smelly he is.

Parents should know that there is some gross humor in this book such as images of the monster cooking up a stew made out of rats and cockroaches and images of the monster eating mosquitoes and worms. 

Overall, “Diary of a Monster” is a fantastic book for anyone who is a huge fan of books about monsters and it is definitely worth the read!  I would recommend this book to children ages five and up since some of the gross humor might be a bit too much for some children.

 You might also like:

• Diary of an Ogre by Valeria Davila

• Is a Worry Worrying You? by Ferida Wolff and Harriet May Savitz
• The Dangerous Alphabet by Neil Gaiman

[ARC REVIEW] This is a Whoopsie! by Andrew Cangelose

Title:  This is a Whoopsie!

Author:  Andrew Cangelose

Artist:  Josh Shipley 

Genre:  Children's / Humor / Animals

Year Published: 2018

Year Read:  2018

Publisher: Lion Forge

Source:  eARC (NetGalley)

Content Rating:  Ages 5+ (Nothing Objectionable)

Buy on:  Amazon  //  Book Depository

I would like to thank NetGalley and Lion Forge for providing me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

After reading “This is a Taco!” by Andrew Cangelose, along with artwork by Josh Shipley, I never would have thought that there would be another book from this series!  Enter “This is a Whoopsie!” and I automatically went to NetGalley and gave this new picture book a shot and man, was it one of the funniest books I had ever read!

Meet Whoopsie!  He is a moose!  And this book is supposed to teach children about moose and what their lifestyle is like in real life.  Unfortunately, Whoopsie is extremely clumsy and he is constantly falling over himself on each page.  After making too many mistakes, Whoopsie decides that he is not the right moose for the job.  But, his bluebird friend thinks differently.

Will Whoopsie find something that he is really good at?

Read this book to find out!

Wow!  Andrew Cangelose has done it again!  I just loved the way that Andrew Cangelose writes the humor in this book as it is full of wit and sarcasm and it just makes this book a treat to read through!  I also like the fact that this book has a more heartwarming tone than the previous book “This is a Taco!” did since this book focuses on the friendship between Whoopsie the Moose and the little bluebird who keeps helping him out.  Josh Shipley’s artwork is another aspect of the book that I really enjoyed as the artwork is humorous and creative to look at.  I especially loved the images of Whoopsie the Moose himself as he has a goofy expression, but he can also sport friendly expressions on his face whenever he is talking to the bluebird.

Overall, “This is a Whoopsie!” is a fantastic read for anyone who loves good humor and books about friendship and children will enjoy this book for many years!  I would recommend this book to children ages five and up since there is nothing inappropriate in this book, unless smaller children would have trouble understanding the humor of this book.

You might also like:

• This is a Taco! by Andrew Cangelose

• The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales by Jon Scieszka

• The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs! by Jon Scieszka