Science Snafu: Oh, No! (Or How My Science Project Destroyed the World) by Mac Barrett

OH, NO!

OH, MAN.

I KNEW IT.

I never should have built a robot for the science fair.

Everything was going so well...

Until the rampage started, that is.

In the wake of the Gulf of Mexico oil rig disaster, Mac Barnett's hot-off-the-press picture book Oh No!: Or How My Science Project Destroyed the World (Hyperion, 2010) seems positively prophetic, absolutely allegorical, a parable of the human propensity to think big without necessarily thinking through our creations.

Our young heroine, doubtless the star science student in Mrs. Turnham's fifth grade class, certainly is thinking big when she rolls out her giant robot--blueprints and all. Surrounded by the usual baking-soda-and-vinegar volcanoes and paper mache solar system models, it's impressive, all right. Unfortunately, in the way of scientific devices, this one follows the law of unforeseen consequences, leaving its designer wishing she'd thought about the unthinkable a little more here.

Giant stainless steel claws? Maybe unnecessary add-ons here. And when the unfortunate creator tries voice commands--"Hey, Robot, knock it off already!"--she discovers that what she forgot to add was ears! Hastily, she scribbles a sign to halt the carnage, only to discover that she "forgot" to teach the robot to read. Brute force doesn't work, either; she neglected to program into her robot the power to feel pain! Quickly improvising, she grabs a nearby toad from another kid's exhibit, and radiates it into a giant mutant monster and orders it to destroy the rampant robot. Her ploy works, but then... (deja vu all over again) TOAD doesn't stop the destruction there. Oh, no! She forgot to irradiate the annihilative amphibian's DNA to self-destruct as soon as the runaway robot is disarmed.

OOOOPS!

The saga of the science experiment gone amuck has been around since Mary Shelley penned Frankenstein in 1818, and that fictional parable is still as powerful as ever. Author Mac Barnett probably didn't know just how timely his publication date of June 1, 2010, was to be when he wrote this little tale, but his story of a science exhibit gizmo that destroys everything in its path now seems predictive of what can happen when scientists fail to build in plenty of fail-safe redundancies. Dan Santat's illustrations are a perfect foil, in a tour de force design that extends the simple text with touches of whimsy and humor which will keep kids pouring over each page. His deadpan-serious little scientist has all the right technical moves, but realizes with horror that she's neglected to foresee the big picture, and when Santat's perspective zooms out as the scope of mayhem enlarges, we see just what her half-baked science hath wrought. As Kirkus Reviews puts it succinctly, illustrator Dan Santat's design is a seamless blend in which "comic-book, picture-book and movie styles come together in a well-designed package."

And that's more than we can say for that science project!

The Lessons of History: OH, NO! NOT AGAIN! by Mac Barnett

WHAT A DISASTER!

LUCKILY, THERE IS A SIMPLE SOLUTION.

I JUST NEED TO BUILD A TIME MACHINE AND CHANGE HISTORY.

Is our girl genius going to head off a world-wide disaster--an earthquake, a plague, an asteroid strike, maybe?

Well, no. Her personal disaster is missing the first question on her history test.

In what country do we find the oldest prehistoric cave paintings?

She said Belgium. Her teacher says France.

Undeterred by the old saw that you can't change history and the examples of those fictional characters who have run into difficulties back in time, our bespectacled supernerd quickly fashions a time machine from a discarded wading pool and a few knickknacks lying around the basement. The solution to her problem is simply to make a flying trip back to Belgium in 33,000 BCE with a few art supplies, leave a cave painting in an obvious spot, and voila! Instant A+ exam!

There are a few initial glitches. Our girl's first trial take her a lit-tle too far back in time, where she gets to witness the first fish crawling out of the sea and trading gills for lungs. Back to the old drawing board to calibrate the machine a bit. But, ooops! This time she lands in 1815 in the midst of the Napoleonic Wars.

But the third time is the charm. It's proto-Belgium: 33,000 BCE, and yay! There are two unemployed Neanderthal guys just hanging out around the cave. Our girl genius hauls out the art stuff and hands out paint brushes and a palette.

Hmmmm. It's seems that the ache to create has not yet appeared in these lads' genome. One goofs around for a giggle by sticking the brushes up his nose. (Apparently that elementary school gag gene had been expressed even back then.) The other Neander-artist tries a bite of the palette. After her inept cave dudes turn out to be duds, our girl genius grabs the spray-paint cans out of their hands and zooms inside the cavern to do the deed herself.

Mission accomplished, a stylish robot painted on the cave wall, she emerges, ready to fly back to the future where her A+ test will be waiting on her desk, only to find that her prehistoric pals have been taking her time travel trike out to tool around in time, returning with a few souvenirs of their sojourns with a Roman chariot and Napoleon's chapeau. OH, NO!

"THIS MIGHT AFFECT THE HISTORY TEST!"

You know it!

As they did in their hit, Oh No!: Or How My Science Project Destroyed the World, (see my review here) Mac Barnett and Dan Santat combine talents to tell another far-fetched fantasy tale in hilarious cinematographic graphic style in their just published Oh No! Not Again!: (Or How I Built a Time Machine to save History) (Or at Least My History Grade) (Hyperion, 2012).

Our girl genius, like all time-travel protagonists, learns the trying truth that it's hazardous to history (and to your history quiz grade) to make even the tiniest change in old Father Time. The sight gags Santat adds to his bold illustrations (viz. the two Neanderthals pressing the enticing buttons on the spray cans, pointing them unfortunately to paint their own faces) set off Barnett's quirky tale to a T for Time. The imaginative design elements include endpapers showing the blueprints for the time machine, an appended map of The Loop Time Travel Service, and a dust jacket which reverses to reveal a movie poster.

"Barnett’s deadpan prose and Santat’s page-popping art hilariously reveal what happens when you mess with history, while delivering a light message about the perils of perfectionism," says the Publishers Weekly reviewer.

Have You Seen My Friend? The Adventures of Beekle! An Unimaginary Friend by Dan Santat

HE WAS BORN ON AN ISLAND FAR AWAY WHERE IMAGINARY FRIENDS WERE CREATED.

HERE, THEY LIVED AND PLAYED, EACH EAGERLY AWAITING TO BE IMAGINED BY A REAL CHILD.

But Beekle must be hard to imagine, because he has been waiting for his turn far too long. At last he takes matters into his own pudgy hands and does the unimaginable: he sets out, captain of his fate, on his own, steering his own boat, crossing rough seas with fairly unimaginable creatures, and thinking of the friend that must be out there, somewhere, in the real world.

THE REAL WORLD WAS A STRANGE PLACE. NO KIDS WERE EATING CAKE. NO ONE STOPPED TO HEAR THE MUSIC.

Beekle has disembarked in a big city, where everyone seems to be bustling somewhere--but everyone is also in their own world, reading newspapers, listening to the music in their own ears, even catching a nap as they ride the subway. Nobody notices a doughy, blocky blob of a little guy hopefully wearing his paper crown. He's nobody's imaginary friend. He's invisible in the crowd, unimagined among the skyscrapers and busy traffic.

HE FELT VERY SAD. THEN HE HEARD....

"HELLO!"

There is a girl there. She can see him and she's talking to him. Shy at first, they smile.

THERE WAS SOMETHING ABOUT HER THAT FELT JUST RIGHT.

Finding the one who can imagine the real you is the theme of noted author and artist Dan Santat in his newest creation, The Adventures of Beekle: The Unimaginary Friend (Little Brown, 2014). Santat's narrative style is simple and yet evocative of the loneliness of the crowd. His artwork here is so varied and creative that it almost defies description, as he takes his main character from tropical island to the seascapes inhabited by unknown sea creatures, and into a hard-edged rectilinear urban scene in grim contrast to his pillowy, billowy little hero. The contrasting island to ocean to cityscape settings give Santat a chance to showcase his considerable illustrative chops, displayed in pencil, ink, watercolors, and Photoshop art, in a story of an imaginary friend like no other. "...Like Beekle's new friend, there's something here that feels just right as an "unimaginary" friendship creates a joyous, recognizable bond. A terrific addition to any library," says School Library Journal in its starred review.

Santat's inimitable illustrative style can be seen in his own Sidekicks and in his artwork in Mac Barnett's Oh No!: Or How My Science Project Destroyed the World and Oh No! Not Again!: (Or How I Built a Time Machine to save History) (Or at Least My History Grade) and Samantha Berger's Crankenstein.

Call Me! Telephone by Mac Barnett

"TELL PETER: FLY HOME FOR DINNER!"

Mama Bird is ready to put her home-cooked dinner, a delicious-looking worm pot pie, on the table. All she needs is to get Peter in to wash up and dinner will be served.

The Cardinal she chooses to be the message bearer has his baseball bat over his shoulder and obviously has his head in the game. He relays the message, just a bit scrambled, to a passing goggles-wearing goose.

"TELL PETER: HIT POP FLIES AND HOMERS."

Goose gives the message an aviatorial interpretation.

"TELL PETER: PROP PLANES ARE FOR FLIERS."

Unfortunately, the recipient of the communication is struggling with a late load of laundry to hang on the line, and she's clearly riding another plane of thought. She passes the word on with a wet-wash twist.

"TELL PETER: PUT YOUR WET SOCKS IN THE DRYER."

Will Peter get home before the worm pot pie is a leftover? Will he fly home before the owls come out and think that Peter is supposed to be THEIR dinner?

In Mac Barnett's newest, Telephone (Chronicle Books, 2014), it seems that just because a bunch of birds are sitting on the telephone lines, they are not necessarily the best of communicators. A master of the comic twist picture book, Barnett takes the trope of the traditional game of "Telephone" or "Gossip" and gives it his own quirky spin, giving kids a chance to predict how the message with change from the nature of the birds who relay the message. As usual with this game, the final message is a hilarious mishmash, ably illustrated by artist Jen Corace's comic communicators.

Other kid-pleasing books by Mac Barnett include Extra Yarn, Chloe and the Lion, Sam and Dave Dig a Hole and Oh No!: Or How My Science Project Destroyed the World.

Bot Bash: Robot Rumpus by Sean Taylor

With Mary Poppins apparently already engaged, two parents opt for robot child care from the new Schott catalog so that they can head out for a night on the town. Dressed to the nines, they trip out the door, waving blithely, leaving their daughter in the care of cutting-edge new babysitting bots.

MOM SAID, "THEY'RE THE LATEST MODELS.
WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?"

Famous last words. All goes well at first. Cook-Bot stirs up a passable pot of spaghetti, and Clean-Bot does up the dishes all spic and span. Wash-Bot runs a warm bath, and the girl prepares to step in.

I GOT MY BATH TOYS DOWN OFF THE SHELF.
BUT THAT'S WHEN THE RUMPUS BEGAN.
WASH-BOT WAS AFRAID OF MY TOY CROCODILE.
LIGHTS FLASHED!

The automatons run amok. Tooth-Bot squirts the toothpaste wildly into the loo, Dry-Bot blow-dries everyone, and Dress-Bot puts pajamas on Book-Bot. In the middle of the melee, Cook-Bot appears to fill the tub with gallons of spaghetti. Their circuits clearly crossed, the rest of the robots finally fritz out, and collapse on the parents' bed, ensuring that Mom and Dad's big night out will be a l-o-o-o-n-g one.

Next time they want to party, the parents should borrow Rosy from the Jetsons!

In yet another takeoff on the sorcerer's apprentice premise, (in which the enchanted broom can't stop carrying pails of water until the magician's castle is flooded), Sean Taylor's Robot Rumpus (Anderson Press, 2013) gives the runaway gizmo storyline another go. Although it's no competition for Tomie dePaola's Caldecott classic, Strega Nona, in which noodle-head Big Anthony tries out the forbidden magic pasta pot and fills the town with spaghetti, Taylor's bumbling bot tale is ingeniously illustrated by Ross Collin's wittily inventive robots which will definitely switch on kids' autonomic giggle boxes.

Charge up the giggle batteries with this one along with Mac Barnett's funny and Frankensteinian Oh No!: Or How My Science Project Destroyed the World (see review here) or John Scieszka and David Shannon's Robot Zot! (review here).

The Grumpster: Crankenstein by Samantha Berger and Dan Santat

EVERY MORNING DURING THE PRODUCTION OF THIS BOOK, DAN SANTAT DEPRIVED HIMSELF OF COFFEE.

JUST THE RIGHT AMOUNT OF CRANKINESS WAS IMPERATIVE!

And why would that erstwhile jolly jokester Dan Santat want to get in a grouchy groove? Because he's got to find the proper funk to draw Crankenstein as he goes through one of his downright disgruntled days.

HAVE YOU SEEN CRANKENSTEIN? YOU'D TOTALLY KNOW IF YOU HAD. YOU'D SAY "IT'S A GOOD DAY!"

CRANKENSTEIN WOULD SAY...


MEHHRRRR!

Crankenstein is a bit of a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde hybrid. He'll be looking like a regular kid, about to tuck into a stack of pancakes... and if there's only a pitiful drop of syrup left in the bottle, he becomes ... Crankenstein. A cold rain, untied shoelaces dragging in the puddles, a bit of dog poo on his shoe, a melting-too-fast popsicle, a long, long, line for the carnival ride, a spoonful of gross-o medicine--all are enough to turn his face as green as the Incredible Hulk's and signal a temper tantrum on the way! Is there anything out there funny enough to make this sulky kid smile?

Samantha Berger's just-published Crankenstein (Little, Brown, 2013), peevishly illustrated by a sullen, out-of-sorts, definitely decaffeinated Dan Santat, has just the right tongue-in-cheek touch to tug a smile out of the grumpiest kid, especially when he gets the chance to meet another grumpster just as temperamental as he is. Calling all ye green meanies! As Kirkus Reviews promises, "Get ready to read this aloud a lot.

Presumably, author Samantha Berger is into bad behavior, being the author of Martha Doesn't Share! and Martha Doesn't Say Sorry! (see my reviews here), and Dan Santat has surely battled his share of bad outcomes in his illustrations for Mac Barnett's Oh No!: Or How My Science Project Destroyed the World. (see review here).