by Moe Zilla

Created on: February 23, 2010

"Beware of Boys" features a hungry wolf who has captured a little boy.  He announces that he plans to eat the boy, and in every single drawing, fangs poke out of his mouth. There's even recipes in the book for the ways in which boys are cooked. But unfortunately for the wolf - this little boy is clever.

The boy offers a helpful suggestion - "a very good recipe for Boy Soup."  The wolf dribbles and says "MMMMMMMMMM" - and then demands a list of ingredients. Soon he's scrambling around the forest collecting vegetables, some fruit chews, and entire barrel of bricks.  But when he returns, the boy reveals that the wolf forgot the most important ingredient.

You'd never try cooking Boy Soup if you didn't have salt….

Fortunately the boy knows another delicious salt-free recipe - for Boy Pie. ("It's three times as good as Boy Soup!") This one includes more tricky ingredients, including six sacks of cement, plus "one moo-cow of milk." But when the wolf finally returns, he learns he's again forgotten the most important ingredient. Salt.

"But you said this one needed no salt."

"Well, it does…"

Tony Blundell draws the wolf like a funny character from Mad magazine - and he also wrote the story's text.  This lets him add extra jokes by using the pictures to contradict the words. When Blundell writes that the boy "was captured by a hungry wolf," he illustrates it with the smiling boy riding piggy-back on the wolf's shoulders.  "Silly boy," says the wolf, as they head towards his cave…

In the next drawing, the boy folds his arms as if he's mildly amused by the wolf's aggression.  And throughout the entire book, the boy's always got a smile on his face. A funny drama arises from the book's simple premise - because both characters have a strong personality.  The boy is cheerful and confident, while the boy-eating wolf is greedy but stupid.

"Raw?" asks the boy, about the wolf's menu preparations. And the wolf obliges by roaring - because he'd misunderstood the question.

Even the recipes are funny, with lively illustrations of the strange ingredients, and unusual instructions hidden at the end of the instructions.  ("Place the boy in a warm room and allow to watch television.… Carefully add the bicycle, sand, and daffodils… If it rains, stand in the outhouse…  Sit on the barrel of bricks and stir with the trowl until Thursday."

And ultimately the book arrives at a very satisfying conclusion.  The wolf, exhausted, collapses under a pile of ingredients. The boy uses the cement and the bricks to build a wall across the wolf's cave. Then he bikes home to his mother, where he presents her with the bouquet of daffodils. Then he sits down to a delicious meal that his mother has loving prepared for him.

"Silly old wolf," he thinks to himself.

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