Jitterbug Jam

By Barbara Jean Hicks

This was such a fun book! Yet another children's picture book I would not have read if I did not have the fantasy/science fiction genre to present. It is a book about a young monster who is afraid of the boy hiding under his bed at night. The story is told in the little monster's point of view and so is not in grammatically correct English. The author uses repetition with the tongue-twister phrase "lickity-split and spit-fish" which is quite amusing to read. I liked how the family consisted of two brothers, a mother, and a grandfather. Some children could maybe relate to living with a grandparent, which is not portrayed in children's literature very often. I thought the end to the story was very cute how it related to the title. While reading the book I kept wondering where Jitterbug Jam came from. It wasn't until the end where the little monster makes friends with the human kid by sharing a piece of toast with the monster form of jelly on it-jitterbug jam. The illustrations were very different and really captured the theme of monsters, I really liked them. One page is just one big picture to show the climax of the story when the little monster gets up the nerve to go under his bed to find the human boy. I also noticed that the paper was not shiny and slick like most picture books, it had the feel of construction paper. Overall, I loved this book and will be putting it on my Christmas list this year!