Through the humorous juxtaposition of text and illustrations this lively picture book is a fun tiff on the old saying "Do as I say and not as I do."

On this book's sly cover, a red-haired girl sneers out of a picture frame. An angel's halo hovers over the frame, but something is amiss. This girl, apparently now a "Mommy," has the arched eyebrow and crooked smile of a playground tyrant. Like the tongue-in-cheek title, which plays on the presumed sweetness of "Mommy" and "little," the ingenuous text mimics a child's voice. "My mommy says that when she was little, she ate everything on her plate./ She never put her fingers in her nose./ She never pulled the dog's tail." Simultaneously, crude cartoon images, drawn in rough black ink and blood-red paint on an oatmeal-beige background, contradict every word. The young bully cackles at oversize graffiti reading "poop fart peepee" ("She never used rude words"), draws ugly caricatures on the wall and terrifies her brother with a scary book at bedtime. Most of the spreads, including one in which the girl wears a stethoscope and a threatening grin, make for qualified hilarity ("She never played doctor with the little boy next door"). Some, such as a close-up of the girl as a red-faced ogre, are downright scary ("Mommy never behaved like a little monster"). Throughout, the coy statements and brutish images question parental honesty and children's credulousness ("And I always believe every word my mommy says. Don't you?"). This knowing book allows for skepticism toward adults, and its wicked irony puts it in league with cathartic titles like I'm Not Bobby! and Alicia Has a Bad Day. All ages. (Oct.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

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K-Gr 2-An unseen narrator glibly lists all of those things that her mother says she always did, or didn't do, when she was a child. "She never put her fingers in her nose.- She never played doctor with the little boy next door.- She was always polite, especially to old ladies." Each statement appears opposite an irreverent portrait of Mommy's bad behavior, such as pulling the dog's tail or cracking her whip yelling, "GIMME" as she demands a Barbie. The expressive illustrations are drawn with a child's sensibility using broad ink strokes and unsteady lines, yet the emotional impact belies the simplicity of design. This could be due to the use of red as the mother's defining color, with her pigtailed red hair and messy red dress, or it could be the protruding teeth and devilish glint in her eye or the grotesque pile of damaged toys (other children's). Even though the book touches on a dynamic that is real, it carries its vision too far and comes across as mean-spirited and scary, rather than amusing.-Martha Topol, Traverse Area District Library, Traverse City, MI Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.