Basic Brief-ing: Veggies With Wedgies by Todd Doodler

It all begins when Farmer Jones carefully hangs his family's laundry outside to dry.

What can happen, right?

If the clothesline features undies, lots of super silly storybook lines are sure to follow, at least if author-cartoonist Todd Doodler is in the vicinity of the vegetable garden.

"WHAT ARE THOSE?" ASKED PUMPKIN.

Cuke hasn't a clue, but thinks they are cool. Beet thinks they look beguiling. Mushroom thinks they look mysterious. Nobody knows what they are, but Asparagus aims for a pair anyway. Pea pipes up with a supposition that they are undies brought by the Underwear Fairy.

Carrot pops up and pointedly offers a brief explanation of the purpose of undergarments.

"UNDERWEAR IS WHAT PEOPLE WEAR UNDER THEIR CLOTHES!

UNDER WEAR! GET IT?"

Of course, nothing will do but that the vegetables take down the Jones' family's drawers and try them on, with many comic misfits ensuing. Mushroom puts one pair of tighty whities on his head. Corn does a lot of hopping and wiggling to stretch the underwear to fit. Onion winds up wearing his backwards, thong style.

"THE VEGGIES ALL HAD TERRIBLE WEDGIES."

Only a Todd Doodler story would set up such a preposterous plot line just to get to that internally rhyming punchline, but as he so ably proved in his top-selling Bear in Underwear books, a man can create a career with unlikely characters drawn in, well, drawers, as he does in his latest, Veggies with Wedgies (Little Simon, 2014).

Underwear is a subject that preschoolers universally perceive as hilarious, and the penchant persists well into the primary years. A stalk of broccoli in briefs or an onion giving himself a wedgie is bound to draw a drawer-ful of giggles from tots just coming to terms with their own underthings. Get to the bottom of undie humor by pairing this one with Claire Freedman's Aliens Love Underpants, Dinosaurs Love Underpants (The Underpants Books) or Aliens in Underpants Save the World (The Underpants Books).