There's No Such Thing as Vegetables
by Kyle Lukoff (Author) Andrea Tsurumi (Illustrator)
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.
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Kirkus
Subversion in the salad! Destabilization with dressing! Social constructs fall by the wayside in this clever review.
Publishers Weekly
Sent to an abundant community garden to gather vegetables for a salad, young Chester is quickly thwarted by the prospective ingredients--who insist that vegetables aren't really a thing--in this category-savvy picture book. Digitally finished pencil cartoons by Tsurumi (Mr. Watson's Chickens) portray the garden habitués with maximum spunk as each insists on being called by their given name and plant part rather than being labeled as a vegetable. A broccoli floret named Juanita says it's a flower, kale bundle Beatrice is a leaf, Pietro the potato is a root, and an eggplant, cucumber, and pepper (Damon, Karen, and Parveen, respectively) are "fruits, dude." Chester, who reads as East Asian, gets an informative earful via dialogue balloons by Lukoff (Awake, Asleep), whose colorful garden personalities are bound to tickle readers. So too will the idea that basic concepts can prove more social construct than fact--or, as an ear of corn explains by way of analogy, "Don't think too hard about language and how every word you say is just a collection of random sounds." An author's note concludes. Ages 4-8. Author's agent: Saba Sulaiman, Talcott Notch Literary. Illustrator's agent: Stephen Barr, Writers House. (Feb.)
Copyright 2023 Publishers Weekly, LLC Used with permission.
JUV009080 - Juvenile Fiction | Concepts | Words
JUV029040 - Juvenile Fiction | Science & Nature | Flowers & Plants
Vegetables
