Nothing Wee About Me!, imagination play that’s just OK

The title of the book flows off the tongue. On the cover we see a young girl who we’ll come to know at Liesel, she’s taunting a dragon ten times bigger than her with a ladle. Once we open the book we’ll also meet her younger brother and her grandmother. They all go into her seaside cottager where the kids set upon playing with their imagination as they visit a castle, volcano and meeting all manner of friendly animals. But whatever you do, don’t accuse Liesel of being a wee girl. Grandma does and her response becomes the rallying cry for her as she fights down pirates or anything else that seems impossible.

Nothing Wee About Me is an interesting book for a couple reasons. First up is the usage of ‘wee’ in the title. When our oldest knew that it was an ‘olden day’ word for small. Those are his words. Our 8 year-old thought that it was a euphemism for go to the bathroom. If kids discover Nothing Wee About Me! in the company of an adult then they’ll certainly know that ‘wee’ can have two meanings. One of them is colloquial and the other is normally said with a dialect that’s more at home with Miss Doubtfire. Homonyms are indeed the words in the English language that merit frustrations of ESL teachers everywhere.

The other reason it’s an interesting book is its length. It’s a long good-night or story time book. We love long books, but when it comes to story time the book’s content needs to be the driver. In the case of Nothing Wee About Me the content is only as good as the reader. If the reader is having a down, slow or bummer of a day then the audience’s opinion of the book will vary.

Because the book is based on imagination play, specifically Liesel’s interaction with various rogue characters and animals she has a lot of potentially fun banter. If you’re high energy then you can pepper the dialogue to no end. However, if you read it dry or without emotion then the young audience members might be a bit bored.

The art in the book is very pretty, but at the same time very grounded in reality. There aren’t wild, bright colors that will attract young eyes that want to wander. If your reader is dedicated and goes page to page then they’ll enjoy the story and imagination based play. The text is appropriate for most third graders to read on their own without any assistance. That age will get tired of the book quickly as the illustrations and story are too young. Second graders will like the story, but will get tripped up on the words. In the end, it’s a story time book that feels long if you’re constrained by the clock.

There are affiliate links in the post because, dragons.