Post by Mark T. Locker.

This is Not My Hat by Jon Klassen.

If you are a connoisseur of fine children’s picture books, perhaps you have heard of I Want My Hat Back. Or, if you are regular reader of this blog, maybe you saw my review almost a year ago TO THIS VERY DAY of that lovely, subtle, hilarious book. (If not, don’t worry. I hyperlinked it for you.) Jon Klassen’s new book takes a new twist on what worked so well the first time. This is indeed another story about hat theft in the animal world, only this time we see the crime from the perpetrator’s perspective.

“This is not my hat,” the little fish begins, “I just stole it. I stole it from a big fish. He was asleep when I did it.”

So carries on the little fish while we the readers see that the big fish indeed woke up sooner than the perp anticipated, and indeed the giant victim is hot on the fins of this diminutive ne’er-do-well. And although the little fish makes a good point about the hat being far too small for the big fish, it is not for him to decide! That being said, I think the little bowler looks quite dashing on the little guy, but I cannot approve of his methods of acquisition.

I can, however, approve of this book. Few can take a successful theme and make a second book out of it without it coming off as horribly derivative but Jon Klassen pulls it off brilliantly. Just go read it.