Biographical Note:
Kyle Lukoff is the author of Different Kinds of Fruit, Explosion at the Poem Factory, and many other books for young readers. His favorite "vegetable" is whichever one he's eating at the moment. He's mildly allergic to figs, will never forget his first Concord grape, and loves thinking about how language creates categories. He climbs every tree he can and once got into a fight about whether a vegetable garden could have tomatoes in it.
kylelukoff.com
Andrea Tsurumi is the author and illustrator of the books Accident!, Crab Cake, and I'm On It, and they have illustrated many more, including Mr. Watson's Chickens and the Kondo & Kezumi series. They live with their spouse and carrot-loving dog in Philadelphia. Find out more at:
andreatsurumi.com
Review Quotes:
"A boy sets out for vegetables and gets an earful from a garden of anthropomorphic edible plants in funny, informational picture book . . . Tsurumi's pencil-drawn, digitally colored characters add buoyant humor to Lukoff's sly, kid-friendly demonstration of social constructs and plant biology factoids. The emotive garden flora is as rich in opinions as in nutrients. Young readers will likely giggle at their sass, which makes the educational components more palatable, just as the perfect dressing elevates a salad." -- Shelf Awareness
Publisher Marketing:
A hilarious new picture book that exposes vegetables for what they truly are--leaves, roots, flowers, and stalks--by National Book Award Finalist and Newbery Honor winner Kyle Lukoff, perfect for fans of the Our Universe series.
Chester plans to have a salad for lunch, but in order to do that, he'll need vegetables. So, off he goes to the community garden, except he quickly learns that he won't be dressing a salad anytime soon. Instead, the vegetables start dressing him down. According to them, "vegetables" don't exist!
I know what you are thinking: What the bell pepper? Vegetables are totally real! But here's the thing: Kale is just a leaf, broccoli is a flower, potatoes are roots, and celery...well, stalks. Thanks to a lively, sassy cast of talking "veggies," Chester learns a valuable lesson about categories and how they shape our understanding of the world.
With a slyly informative text and illustrations that will crack readers up, the schooling in There's No Such Thing As Vegetables will be easy to digest and is a total treat.