I Want to Eat Your Books

The new kid at school turns out to be a green zombie, but he’s interested in eating books, not brains. Parker contributes vibrant, chunky digital illustrations that evoke a sense of real chaos as the young zombie chomps his way through textbooks and paperbacks before setting his sights even higher. Unfortunately, Lefranc’s rhymes tend to lurch around in a manner not unlike that of her green antihero (“The zombie stops and shoots a glare,/ then tilts his head to sniff the air./ His monstrous plan I quickly see/ is to devour the library”), sapping some of the fun from the story. The narrator, a boy in a striped shirt and glasses, is able to turn the zombie’s attention from eating books to reading them, but the last-minute arrival of a mummy, who the zombie subdues in turn, feels tacked on and rushed. Ages 3–6. (Sept.)