My Dad Is Amazing

July 1, 2018
Extol the virtues of parents in this and its companion volume, My Mom is Magical.Each of these winning board books is dedicated to the respective, titular parent of the author-and-illustrator team, sisters Sabrina and Eunice Moyle, who together are the design studio Hello!Lucky. The over-the-top enthusiasm of these volumes may, therefore, be reasonably excused, as the creative team's love for their subjects seems as sincere as it is hyperbolic. A series of wild metaphors and analogies celebrate Dad or Mom; the near-blinding bright colors and kinetic, even chaotic illustrations perfectly complement the exuberant text. "My Dad is cooler than a million Popsicles!" "My Mom is cuddlier than a mountain yak!" A friendly, hipsterized yeti that looks like an extra from Where the Wild Things Are plays Dad, while Mom is rendered as a sparkly unicorn with rainbow mane and tail--who strikes heroic poses. Descriptive phrasing ranges from sweet to laugh-out-loud silly: Dad, for example, is "funnier than a bunch of underpants!" Funny indeed! Each volume ends by switching voices to break the fourth wall: "Kid, you're amazing" (or "magical") "too!" Both books are visual treats, sure to engage with their brilliant hues and inventive (if occasionally stereotypical) images. Dad is imagined at one point as a masked, lucha libre wrestler, for example, and Mom teaches a classroom of owlets mathematical formulae in glasses and an "I [heart] Math" T-shirt. Families may want both books, or either, as applicable.Superlative silliness. (Board book. 1-3)

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