Review - A Potato on a Bike

A Potato on a Bike
by Elise Gravel
Date: 2019
Publisher: Orca Book Publishers
Reading level: C
Book type: picture book
Pages: 32
Format: e-book
Source: NetGalley

This delightful board book will make the little ones in your life giggle at the absurdity of a fly on the phone and a carrot in the tub. The text's repeated asking Have you ever seen...? preceding the refrain No way! will have toddlers yelling "No way!" themselves as you read through these silly situations. Celebrated artist Elise Gravel brings the silly to a new level in A Potato on a Bike, because really, has anyone ever seen a broccoli counting to ten or a sausage reading a book? But wait, how about a...baby being tickled?! Uh-oh, I think the answer for that is--yes way!

(synopsis from Goodreads)

Sometimes simple is good. And sometimes simple is simply too simple.

This book rambles on and gets rather tiresome. Maybe if you're two, you might enjoy looking at things like a carrot in a bathtub and poop wearing glasses, and being asked continually, "Have you ever seen [insert weird sight here]?" But if you're the poor adult who has to read this repetitive board book over and over again? As the book itself says: "No way!"

I'm definitely not the audience for this one. It's just too juvenile and uninteresting for me. I wouldn't want to have to read it to kids, either; it's far too repetitive after about the first five questions (and there are fifteen in total).

Thank you to NetGalley and Orca Book Publishers for providing a digital ARC.

Premise: 2/5
Meter: n/a
Writing: 2/5
Illustrations: 2/5
Originality: 2/5

Enjoyment: 2/5

Overall: 2 out of 5