cover image Meena

Meena

Sine van Mol, illus. by Carianne Wijffels. Eerdmans, $17 (26p) ISBN 978-0-8028-5394-3

In this Belgian team's English-language debut, three neighborhood children%E2%80%94Klaas, Christa, and Thomas%E2%80%94begin watching Meena, an old woman on their street. She's ugly, and they think she's a witch. "She eats toads," Klaas shouts. "She drinks blood," Thomas adds. The discovery that Meena has a granddaughter, Anna, only fans their fears ("Did the witch put a spell on you so that now you have to visit her all the time?" the children ask Anna). Yet when Thomas delivers a threatening letter to Meena ("go away" it reads in messy cursive, "or else!!!!"), the results confound them%E2%80%94and earn Meena their friendship. Wijffels works with soft pencil outlines and abstracted collages, softening some of the story's images (Meena's "blood"%E2%80%94a bucket of cherry juice%E2%80%94is rendered as a group of overlapping red circles), while graphically picturing others (Meena is shown with two halves of a toad in her mouth and a child in a large spoon). It's an unapologetically stark picture of childish brutality; while it may be too off-putting for some readers, its honesty will provide a jumping-off place for discussion. Ages 5%E2%80%939. (Aug.)