Bonaparte is worried about going to school since he keeps losing his bones! Luckily, he has a few good friends to turn to. Franky Stein, Blacky Widow, and Mummicula each offer their own unique solutions, but they end up causing Bonaparte a different problem. Will Bonaparte be able to find a way to keep from losing his bones before he has to go to school?
The best part of Bonaparte Falls Apart is easily Will Terry’s illustrations. Despite the Halloween movie monster main characters, the style renders them in a cute, and completely non-frightening manner. The illustrations were drawn in pencil and then portions were colorized leaving focus points, but the overall color scheme is subdued. Kids are bound to giggle at the pictures as Bonaparte and his friends collect his various bones that continue to fall of his frame while doing everyday activities such as riding a bicycle and playing catch.
[alert variation=”alert-info”]Publisher: Crown Books for Young Readers
Formats: Hardcover, eBook, Kindle
Purchase: Powell’s | Amazon | iBooks[/alert]
The story is cute, but ends rather abruptly. The ending leaves the reader feeling like there could have been more, to the extent that I double checked the page a few times to make sure there wasn’t another one stuck to final page. The copy I read for review also did have one print issue – the page that depicts Bonaparte with the dog licking his face (sorry, there are no visible page numbers) is slightly offset rendering the whole page somewhat blurry – but hopefully isn’t something to be found in the entire print run, and is certainly not enough to ruin the experience for young readers.
This is a cute picture book that is great for Halloween, but also for fall in general with kids dealing with the new school blues.
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