Tasty Baby Belly Buttons: A Japanese Folktale - Judy Sierra

Japanese tale is reinvented with humor.

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Common Sense rates it
4
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Book details
  • Author:Judy Sierra
  • # of pages: 29
  • Publisher:Knopf
  • Original Publication Date: 01/01/1999
  • Genre: Fiction - Folklore
  • Paperback: $6.99
  • Publisher's Recommended Reading Level: Ages 4-8
  • Read Aloud: 2+
  • Read Alone: 6+

Parents need to know

Parents need to know that the monsters that make off with a bunch of babies may worry some little ones. But humorous, repetitious language will have kids changing aloud.

Families can talk about the David-and-Goliath nature of the story. Little Uriko dares to do what none of the adults will do. What do you admire about her? Do you think you would be so brave?

Message

Social Behavior:

Consumerism:

Drugs/Alcohol/Tobacco:

Violence

An almost slapstick battle may frighten toddlers. The littlest listeners may fear the monsters.

Sex

Language

Common Sense says

What's the story?

Reviewed by Amy Brotman

Little conquers big! Big monsters munch baby belly buttons, but a little girl defeats a gang of them and rescues a bunch of babies. Read-aloud audiences will love pointing at the amusing pictures and shouting that fun, bounce-off-your-lips phrase: "Tasty baby belly buttons!"



Is it any good?

4

Meilo So's wild, swirling lines and unusual greens and oranges help create an otherworldly setting that matches the timeless folktale narrative. Observant children will laugh at Uriko's clothing, which resembles the melon from which she was born, and at the many character expressions not described in the text.

Picture-book audiences wiggle with mild fear when the author brings on the terrible oni. In well-timed passages, she eases the tension by highlighting tender moments between an old Japanese couple and their little melon girl, Uriko.

The pages almost turn by themselves as Uriko marches off in her tall wooden sandals to find the monsters who have kidnapped the town's babies. The energy comes to a climax in the slapstick scene in which Uriko and her friends outmaneuver the fat-bellied oni. Children love to linger at that double-page spread.

The only problematic aspect to this original telling of an old Japanese tale is in the foreign phrases that do not correspond to sounds American children understand. Some readers enjoy the unfamiliar phrases, but others are distracted by the sounds that make no sense to them.

So's lively illustrations can also be found in The Beauty of the Beast, a collection of poems, and in The Tale of the Heaven Tree.

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