cover image So Many Dynamos!: And Other Palindromes

So Many Dynamos!: And Other Palindromes

Jon Agee. Farrar Straus Giroux, $13.31 (80pp) ISBN 978-0-374-22473-8

Palindromic pundit Agee follows up his Go Hang a Salami! I'm a Lasagna Hog! with another volume of black-and-white cartoons and punchy captions that can be read forward or backward. Some of the palindromes clearly will tickle kids' fancy: ""Pupil's slipup"" shows a child drawing a caricature of his teacher, unaware that the subject of his ridicule is peering over his shoulder; and a girl sipping through a straw looks aghast at hairy bumps on it (""Straw warts""). Other Agee creations seemed aimed at adults: in ""Diana Bruno, On Urban Aid,"" a woman points at a labyrinthine diagram of where tax dollars are going; and ""Flo, Gin is a sin! I golf!"" says one golf-club-toting nun to a sister grabbing a drink at a bar. Two other palindromes also involve bar scenes, which may offend some parents, librarians or teachers. Also running to the off-color (but likely to please kids) are such cartoons as that of a dog lifting his leg as he addresses a man painting the Tower of Pisa (""As I pee, sir, I see Pisa!""); and that of a scientist gazing through an enormous microscope as a colleague wonders what he sees: ""Snot or protons?"" All ages. (Nov.)