Pretty Ugly

October 23, 2023
This adapted fable by Sedaris (Me Talk Pretty One Day) and the late Falconer (the Olivia series), reworked from a Little Lit anthology comic, is now an elegant standalone that showcases the creators’ urbane morality. Anna Van Ogre is the apple of her monstrous family’s eye. “That’s our girl,” says Grandma when Anna talks with her mouth full of nails. But though the young ogre successfully stomps on flowers and tosses dirt into the family home, her penchant for making adorable “scary” faces (“I’m a bunny!”) is her undoing. Ignoring her mother’s warnings, Anna finds her features stuck in the scariest face of all: a plump-cheeked, wide-eyed, pigtailed human kid. “Real beauty is on the inside,” assures Grandma, but other ogres’ contempt results in the child running away, until Anna takes Grandma’s wisdom in hand, quite literally. Sticking her arm down her throat, she turns herself inside out, becoming a gorgeously grotesque creature—think Bruegel meets Tales from the Crypt—with beet-red, veiny skin, bulbous eyes, and wrinkly brain atop her skull. It’s a happy resolution for all, including any reader who craves a celebration of individuality with a high yuck quotient. Skin tones take the white of the page. Ages 5–7.

December 1, 2023
Grades 1-3 In a brief episode with a fantastically gross denouement, warty, hook-nosed young Anna Van Ogre, who scandalizes her equally homely family by making cute faces ("Look, Grandma, I'm a bunny." "Eeeeeee!"), blows off her mom's warning that her face will stick like that--until the day it actually does. Happily, the profound trauma of having the face of a pretty human child ("I'm a monster!") only lasts until Anna, taking literally her grandma's comforting adage that true beauty is on the inside, reaches deep down her own throat and . . . yanks. The late, great Falconer proved equal to the challenge of depicting Anna and her extended clan, afloat on white pages, with properly ogrish features, but he really outdid himself at the end, as Anna's rosy human cheeks and pert pigtails suddenly give way to a luridly everted head with huge, roly-poly eyeballs and jutting occasional teeth beneath a nakedly exposed brain. Delighted young audiences will definitely not be echoing the reaction of her family: "What a cute kid." They will be demanding repeat readings, though.

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Starred review from January 1, 2024
Beauty (and horror!) is in the eye of the beholder in essayist Sedaris' disgustingly hilarious debut picture book, illustrated by the late Falconer. Anna Von Ogre is usually a "good" little monster; she talks with her mouth full and stomps on flowers. Unfortunately, she's also prone to "bad" behavior, such as making terrifyingly adorable faces. Though she's been warned that someday one might stick, she ignores this advice, and the unthinkable happens. Stuck with the face of a kewpie doll, Anna is assured by her grandma that "Real beauty is on the inside." But it isn't until she takes that advice literally that she finds a fitting and grotesque solution to her problem. Sedaris shows a keen knack for page turns and timing. Adult readers will recognize hints of Maurice Sendak and William Steig and maybe even a smattering of Tim Burton in this remarkable outsider tale. Anna's solution (to literally pull herself inside out) is rendered in hot pink, much in contrast with the subdued olive green and touches of red in the rest of the book. Be prepared for the shock of this image, sure to elicit both gasps of disgust and barks of surprised laughter. Kids will be transfixed. Adults should feel free to hand this book to anyone who feels picture books are too "safe" these days. Characters have skin the white of the page. Consider this little monstrosity a much-needed corrective to smarmy platitudes. (Picture book. 4-7)

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March 1, 2024

K-Gr 2-This seems like a familiar, fractured fairy tale at first glance, but pushes its preternatural premise further with an unexpected and welcome narrative thrust. A family of ogres prizes their ugliness above all else, praising their pig-tailed, pointy-eared, wart-nosed daughter Anna for her poor manners and voracious hunger for hardware (she chomps on nails at dinner). Her most uncouth behavior, in their eyes, is making objectively adorable (or horrifying, depending on viewers' aesthetic sensibilities) porcelain doll-like faces. One day, her face sticks like that, and she's left rosy-cheeked and doe-eyed indefinitely, much to her dismay. After locking herself in the woodshed, she comes to that old chestnut of self-understanding: true beauty is found on the inside. In a flourish straight out of a horror film, she literally turns herself inside out, revealing the hot pink, googly-eyed, globby-brained monster lurking just beneath her saccharine exterior. And that's it! This simple story, clearly quirky from the get-go, still manages to shock in its final turn, so prepare readers to be slightly freaked. In his picture book debut, Sedaris's familiar mix of sentimentality and acerbic wit shines through without coming off as self-indulgent. Falconer's sparse, goofily grotesque illustrations leave large swaths of white space for readers to settle into the story, using a calm, sedate visual style to emphasize the contrast of the book's brash neon finale. VERDICT A slightly freaky fable for young readers eager and ready to leave the usually safe world of pictures books behind.-Emilia Packard

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