What Are You So Grumpy About?...Not About Grumpy Old Men!

I consider myself very lucky that I’ve really had great friendships with each of the parents of all of the daycare children I have cared for. I have had some of the best parents and have loved each one of them.

Recently Sonny’s mom, Sue, brought me a book that she had purchased for our daycare. What Are You So Grumpy About? is a fun 32 page hardcover book by Tom Lichtenheld. It has a jacket price of $15.99 US and $22.99 CAN.

Since school has started again things are pretty quiet in the daycare. Not only did Sammi and Jake and Jerry go back to school, Cindy’s mom is on a lay-off from work so I just have 4 year old Sonny right now so he is hearing lots of lots of books all day long. This is one that he has asked for several times and we have fun giggling our way through it.

On the first page we see a scruffled blond haired boy getting out of bed and the question that is written in a large black font is:

Did you get up on the wrong side of the bed?

The story goes on to pose more and more questions about being so grumpy. Things like if his clothes were in the laundry and he had to wear a goofy outfit or receiving underwear for a birthday present.

The final question shows a little girl’s feet being tickled and she tries so hard not to laugh and suddenly forgets why she felt so grumpy.

The illustrations are whimsical cartoon style drawings that were done in ink, colored pencil, gouache, watercolor and the author / illustrator mentions them being done in peas and gravy as well…referring to one of the pages in this book about peas and gravy touching and making the child feel grumpy.

Each page has a bit of a brown hue to it, reminding me a bit of sepia photographs. All of the children are drawn with large heads and small features. The details around them are exaggerated in size or proportion and things like peas with scared faces kept us laughing as we turned from page to page.

This is a fun book to read and one that we can all relate too as well. The more we read this book the more things we find to help us get out of that grumpy mood and giggle.

Sonny just loves the page where we see a boy struggling to hold up a bedroom and the text asks; Did you have to pick-up your room?

Different children are used on each of the pages, sometimes boys sometimes girls. I like that it isn’t just one child that the book is asking about being grumpy, but rather the general question is put out there and when reading we can see that all of us are grumpy sometimes and that different things can make us feel that way.

Mr. Lichtenheld has also written Everything I know About Pirates which was named one of the best children’s books in 2000 by Newsweek and Everything I Know About Monsters While I haven’t read either of these books, I will be sure to check them out because I like the style of this book.

Little Brown and Company published this book in 2003. Mr. Lichtenheld drew what he thought their logo should like on the back inside jacket of this book and true to his style he has a red, yellow, green, brown and blue crayon and the brown crayon is much shorter than the others….Little Brown. Very cute.

This is a great book for children from around 3 years and could be enjoyed by children up to 8 years old.

The text is large, which makes it easy to hold up and read. My only con would be the first time I read this book I had a bit of trouble reading some of the text because of the way it was placed. For instance, when a boy’s laundry was in the wash we see what looks like the front of a washing machine. It is filled with water and the text is placed inside of it too. The letters are done squiggly so as to look like they are being agitated with the laundry so took a bit to figure out the words. This is really only a con on the first read through but there are a couple of places that do take a bit of concentration to figure out.

This review is #22 of the 50 Reviews by Halloween Write Off sponsored by CopeSullivan



It is hard for me to believe that this is review #800 for me. I wanted to review something special and since this book was a gift from a parent and friend and since I’m feeling a bit grumpy myself today it seemed very apropos.