Monsters Never Get Haircuts

by Marie-Hélène Versini, Vincent Boudgourd (Illustrator)

Overview

This funny and quirky picture book celebrates children's imagination.

The narrator of this book knows exactly what monsters are like: they never brush their hair or go to the dentist; they don’t wear glasses or play the piano or put on their shoes . . . Monsters don’t know they are monsters. They don’t do this and they don’t do that, and do you know why? Because monsters don’t exist!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781914912733
Publisher:	Boxer Books
Publication date:	09/05/2023
Pages:	40
Sales rank:	1,016,508
Product dimensions:	11.70(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.20(d)
Age Range:	3 - 6 Years

About the Author

Marie-Hélène Versini is a former journalist, who currently works as a copywriter in advertising. She likes the sea, Italy, animals, plastic arts, clothes (with an obsession for shoes), books, talking nonsense, and making children laugh. She now lives in Rennes, France. 
 
Vincent Boudgourd is the art director at a publicity agency. He enjoys posters and illustrations from the 1950s through the 1970s, traveling, waves, wide-open spaces, and meat and potatoes. He lives in Rennes, France.

Editorial Reviews

07/31/2023

Monsters—they’re not just like us! Adding to the titular pronouncement, Versini supplies a quirky catalog of human behaviors, asserting much that monsters don’t do. They don’t visit the dentist, wear nail polish, sport glasses, swim, or play football, and they definitely “don’t drink strawberry milk,” Versini writes in straightforward phrases. Doodle-style pencil-and-paint-textured illustrations from Boudgourd portray variously shaped monsters attempting or avoiding assorted human pursuits: a toothy Loch Ness–type wears a too-small flowered inflatable inner tube, and a brown many-toed monster stands next to a pair of red heels unlikely to fit. By book’s end, the creators offer a reality-based reassurance for monster-wary young readers. Ages 3–6. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

“[T]he spare text is effective, allowing readers to linger on Boudgourd’s wonderfully beastly oil paint and pencil illustrations . . . . This look at monsters is fun, original, and even a bit soothing.” - Kirkus

From the Publisher

12/15/2023

PreS-K—Monsters have a lot of recognizable traits, including rows of sharp teeth, myriad eyes, and long limbs and hair. But they also are limited in their activities, which changes how they appear to young children. Not only do monsters never get haircuts, but they also are not able to swim, they do not wear glasses, and they are not able to drive. And all this is true because monsters do not exist. This picture book is short and sweet, using brief, repetitive text on each page to describe exactly what monsters are not able to do. Each spread is dominated by an illustration featuring a specific monster either attempting the activity that is mentioned, or adjacent to a human who is doing so. These images are deliberately limited, incorporating visible pencil marks, extensive white space, and a limited color palette, as if these are the sketched notions about monsters from a child's imagination. Despite this book's brevity, it provides a powerful message for children who are frightened by the idea of monsters. Bluntly, monsters do not exist, but here are memorable phrases to carry into everyday life to cultivate emotional resilience. VERDICT This book is an important inclusion to family collections because it helps empower children to overcome any fear of monsters they may have.—Mary R. Lanni

School Library Journal

2023-07-13
Monsters can’t get haircuts, play the piano, or wear nail polish.

There’s plenty of other things that these wild-looking, otherworldly beasts can’t do. A many-eyeballed monster sits on a couch watching television. “Monsters don’t wear glasses,” the text states. A giant creature with long arms bursts out of a car, steering wheel dislodged: “Monsters can’t drive.” And so the pattern continues page after page. Some of the monsters are silly—a Loch Ness–esque sea serpent who can’t swim sports a flowery inner tube. Others skew a bit more playfully frightful, like a toothy, all-black one who isn’t afraid of the dark. The final page shows a child with skin the white of the page snuggled peacefully in bed after realizing that monsters don’t do any of these things because they don’t exist. Translated from French, the spare text is effective, allowing readers to linger on Boudgourd’s wonderfully beastly oil paint and pencil illustrations. No two look similar, and each is a little eerie, though nonthreatening. The majority of the color is used on the monsters; the background items and humans are rendered in pencil. The concept that these creatures can’t do what humans do because they aren’t real is a fresh take and potentially reassuring to young readers. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

This look at monsters is fun, original, and even a bit soothing. (Picture book. 3-5)

Kirkus Reviews