Bored

Sometimes I read books that capture my five-year-old's humor perfectly, and this is one of them. In Felicita Sala's latest book, Bored, a little girl's boredom takes her on a wildly funny and absurd adventure as she imagines that she and all of the other bored people in the world yawn and yawn until they well like balloons, float skyward, and land on a deserted island. Eventually, they are all so bored that they finally do all sorts of fascinating things and make terrific, world-altering discoveries. As only the best authors of children's books do, Sala writes eye-to-eye with children, keenly sensitive to what makes them laugh and worry and wonder. Her watercolor, gouache, and pencil illustrations are soft and dreamy, just beautiful. And for me, always horrified by my own children's declarations of boredom, Bored offers the greatest antidote of all: humor.