by Moe Zilla

Created on: March 24, 2010

"Elwood and the Witch" tells a very funny story, but it's also illustrates it beautifully. The trouble begins when Elwood - a pig - finds an old broom leaning against an oak tree. 'This will do nicely to keep my front step swept," Elwood thinks happily. But if you look closely in the background, you'll see the dim outline of a witch flying in the sky...

But the story is only part of the fun, since illustrator Jos. A. Smith brings the story to life with some magical illustrations. His drawings are detailed and realistic, while still retaining the colorful fun of a children's book. As the pig is lifted into up past the trees, a full moon shines in a blue sky speckled with stars. And then Smith contributes a hilarious drawing of the frazzled witch chasing after him - with striped stockings on spindly legs, and dropping all the mushrooms that she'd been collecting.

"Come back here with my broom!" the witch shouts.
"I can't," Elwood replies. "I don't know how!"

Author Nicholas Heller keeps the humor going with a deadpan narration style. ("Elwood took hold of the broom, and it began to tremble. How peculiar, he thought...") The angry witch hurls spells at the flying pig - mistakenly turning a passing bat into a trout, and a passing cloud into a toad. But her worst mistake is turning the full moon into a giant bee. "The sky went suddenly dark..." Heller writes - and now it's the witch who has to run and hide.

But Smith's drawings really add a lot to the book. He'd been an art instructor for 30 years, but illustrated Jessie Haas's series of children's books about Nora and her grandfather's farm (including Hurry and No Foal Yet). Smith and Heller have collaborated on two other monster-themed books - "Goblins in Green" "Ogres! Ogres! Ogres!" And they're apparently good friends, since a grateful Smith even dedicates the book to Nick Heller (presumably the son of the book's author, Nicholas Heller), adding three words to his dedication:  "Go, Nick, go!"

The book also provides instructions for flying a broom - push right to go left, pull up to go down... And by the end, everything's been sorted out, with the moon smiling down from the sky, and the witch reunited with her broom.

"Elwood smiled up at the moon. Then he set off for home."

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