Monstergarten
Typical kindergarten concerns: Will I like the other kids? Will they like me? It’s the same deal in the monster world but with a twist; the question for purple, striped-horned Patrick is whether he will be scary enough. Good thing he has a blue, dinosaur-tailed best bud named Kevin, who is happy to teach Patrick everything he needs to know. They practice scary faces and study monster behavior in books (growling, fang flashing, and the like), but none of it puts Patrick at ease: “What was the right way for him to be scary?” Kaminsky’s cutely primitive illustrations have every ounce of the bright zip digital tools can bring, with bold splotches of color dominating otherwise white pages, especially when the text disappears to allow for prime-time monster mugging. Mahoney doesn’t let it end monstrously, of course, as it’s Patrick who must be scary on the first day of monstergarten in order to put Kevin at ease. Just about the happiest darned book about being scared you’re likely to find. Preschool-Grade 1. --Daniel Kraus