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Pea, Bee, & Jay #1: stuck together

by Brian “Smitty” Smith
2020 / 64 pages

A bite-sized vegetable, a bug, and a bird wouldn’t seem the most likely of friends, but hey, sometimes the oddest combinations just work, right?

Pea is fresh out of the pod, and likes to roll. When he rolls right past the farm fence into the neighboring forest, the young-un gets a bit flummoxed, especially after a storm hits.

Fortunately, he rolls right into Bee, a very smarter pollinator, who seems to be hiding from her fellow bees. That’s odd, sure, but Bee is willing to help Pea learn the ways of the forest, and the two head off together. What’s Bee’s first lesson for Pea? To stay clear of birds because birds like to eat bugs and peas. Who do they meet immediately after? A blue jay, of course.

But while Jay is indeed a bird, he’s an unusual sort. First off, he doesn’t fly. His nest fell out of the tree when he was but a lad, and he never knew his parents, so there was no one to teach him. Second, he doesn’t seem to eat bugs or peas. This might be the beginning of a wonderful friendship!

The three comrades go on to tangle with a hungry fox, three overzealous acorns, a host of loyal bees – it turns out that Bee is actually the queen of her hive, and as the adventure rounds up, it’s time for her to head back to her royal duties.

Cautions

If there’s a downside to the story, it’d be how Pea sets out on his adventure: he heads past the farm fence on a foolish dare from his “friends” to go check out a tree where he knows his momma wouldn’t want him to go. But, at story’s end, he does get grounded for it and mostly accepts that as a punishment he had coming his way. Added bonus: Pea learns to stop caring what these “friends” think. He was supposed to bring back a leaf to prove he made it to the big oak on the other side of the fence, but when he loses the leaf on the way back, Pea doesn’t care, because even if he can’t prove it, he knows he made it.

Conclusion

There are all sorts of farm-related puns in this one, whether it’s raspberries giving raspberries, or Bee telling some of her subject bees to “buzz off.” It didn’t even hit me, but my kids all thought the PB&J combination of characters was super clever.

There are six books in this series so far, and our family really liked the first three. In the second, Pea, Bee, & Jay #2: Wannabees, Bee’s constant absence from the hive leaves an opening for a usurper named Lenny. Lenny goes over the top with all the trappings of royalty, arranging for a red carpet, trumpets-blowing sort of entrance wherever he goes. That’s kind of annoying, but the other bees figure, well, at least he sticks around! Bee learns her lesson – her people need her to be dependable – and when she is able to prove that Lenny is embezzling honey, she’s in again as Queen Bee.

The third, Pea, Bee, & Jay #3: Lift Off, is still funny, but not quite as good, with Jay learning how to fly with a little help from his friends. It also has a passing mention of diarrhea that it could have done without.

The last three didn’t grab anyone. They weren’t horrible, but certainly aren’t worth recommending. In Pea, Bee, & Jay #4: Farm Feud, things take a turn as two of the friends are feuding for almost the whole book. Yes, they get back together in the end, but their constant fighting meant it just wasn’t fun to come along for this ride.

Pea, Bee, & Jay #5: Gotta Find Gramps starts with the three watching a professional wrestling match, and then discovering Grampa Pea used to be a professional wrestler too. Professional wrestling is often bloody and sexual, and while there’s none of the sex here, it’s just not a “sport” I want my kids to spend a lot of time learning about.

Finally, Pea, Bee, & Jay #6: The Big Bully, is well-intentioned, tackling the topic of bullying. But I think it’s also naive, encouraging kids to befriend their tormenter, because, after all, he’s probably just been bullied himself. That might even be true sometimes, but other times the bullies are just bullies. Many kids won’t have the smarts yet to tell one sort from the other, making this “befriending encouragement” unhelpful and possibly even harmful.

So, three is company, and there’s no need to get the rest.

These would be great for Grades 1-3, though our older girls and their dad appreciated them too, as a quick light read.

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Book Reviews, Graphic novels

Officer Clawsome: lobster cop

by Brian "Smitty" Smith and Chris Giarrusso 2023 / 238 pages In the opening scene a fish peddler (the fish is the peddler, not the goods) calls out "Fresh fruit here! Get your fresh..." only to have something "ZOOOM!" past and purée all his oranges and apples. Momentarily at a loss, the peddler looks down at the soupy mess, only to, one panel later, start smiling again calling out, "Fresh fruit juice here! Get your fresh fruit juice." Comic genius? Not on its own, but just like a good dad-joke (are there any other kind?) the hilarity builds with every one you layer on top. And there are oodles here, including some awful/awesome puns, starting with the hero of our story, the lobster cop "Officer Clawsome," called "Clawful" by the villains he arrests. Like any good cop/buddy flick, Clawsome has a partner, the starfish Stariana who serves as both his badge of office, riding around on his chest, and as his ninja throwing star when needed. When the town's favorite bakery goes missing – the whole building, staff and all, are just gone – the twosome have to take on a whole host of underwater villains including Catburglarfish, the wrestler Masked Mussel, Brain Sturgeon, the Electric Eel, and a giant mechanized shark. It's all sorts of action, with all sorts of cinematic cliches thrown in just for dad to enjoy too – the best is the massive explosion in the background with Clawsome and Stariana strutting in the foreground. One reviewer called this a “safe grandma buying read for the grandkids” and I'd agree. No cautions needed - this is just good clean, very silly fun. And it's so good that even though it weighs in at 200+ pages, your kids won't have had enough. The sequel, Officer Clawsome: Crime Across Time, is, as its title indicates, a time-travel story, and when our fearless duo end up in the prehistoric past, they meet primitive cavefish (ie. their version of cavemen). In other words, while there is nothing all that explicitly evolutionary (no mention of millions of years, for example), there is definitely some implicit evolutionary assumptions on display here. And that might be reason enough to just get the first and hold off on the second....