Contemplating Your Bellybutton (My Body Science)
Kindergarten-Grade 2?This book is crude and unsettling. While its main focus is on the origin of the bellybutton, it also includes such heavy-handed tips as, "You shouldn't play with your bellybutton." The narrator speaks to a boy named Tettchan, who is teased about and ashamed of the fact that his bellybutton sticks out. The tone of the story vacillates between didactic statements and inane asides, such as, "the cord healed and dropped off?plop." The cartoon illustrations move from showing an umbilical cord attaching a fully clothed mother and child to a floating baby in utero. While the book's subject is of interest to many children, the treatment is uneven and uninspired. Originally published in Japan in 1985, this book has definitely lost something in translation.?Martha Topol, Traverse Area District Library, Traverse City, MICopyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.