Finn’s Little Fibs proves that less is more in this go-to illustrated book series

Tom Percival is the king of illustrated books about children’s emotions and feelings. Long live the king. Granted, that’s a niche arena, but nobody does these types of books better than Percival. Finn’s Little Fibs is the ninth entry in the Big Bright Feelings Book series, and it burns with the same guilt-free energy that the rest of them do. But what makes a great illustrated book, much less one that’s attempting to teach a lesson?

Let’s back up for one moment and mention the Big Bright Feelings Book series. Each book in the series concentrates on an aspect of a child’s personality or their interactions with others, like worrying, fear of failure, low self-confidence, being a good friend or other things. They’re oversized books that perfectly lend themselves to story time with the class, a read-aloud experience or sitting in the beanbag chair in the corner quietly acknowledging that you have something in common with the main character.

This series, any book in a series actually, that intends to teach a lesson to children needs to be entertaining. If it just teaches, regardless of how worthy the lesson is, then the audiences will not follow the book, much less engage in the series. It’s got to balance the lesson with entertainment, which could be in the form of well-written text or visuals. Finn’s Little Fibs has the warm, timeless art that Percival creates, in addition to brevity that doesn’t scare off young readers.

The text is brief, but the illustrations allude to much more happening within the story. It can happen in contrasting colors, full-page background shading, and different perspectives and angles from which the illustrations are drawn. They’re timeless and could’ve been created tomorrow, yesterday or thirty years ago. The font looks like it was created on an old-school typewriter. I know children have never typed on that archaic machine, and they don’t need to have ever even seen one. The letters in Finn’s Little Fibs have a very minute degree of wear and tear, with portions of the letters having the letter’s text worn away or incomplete. Again, this is very subtle and most readers won’t even notice it, but the realization of this in the text helps complete the total package of the book.

Finn’s Little Fibs is about a young boy who accidentally breaks something at his grandmother’s house. As most kids are with their nana, he loves spending time with her and disappointing her is the last thing that he wants to do. However, when he breaks her antique clock because he was carelessly bouncing a ball too high, he’s riddled with guilt. As those who are old enough to know, guilt often produces lies, or little white fibs that we think makeup, trick or deflects the blame and attention that our actions have caused.

When Finn utters this obvious lie a small, colorful orb appears next to his shoulder. It has large empathetic eyes that are dubiously looking at him as his lies become more and more absurd. His lies aren’t impossible, they’re just wholly improbable and the orbs multiply like rabbits the more that he talks. This starts to impact his behavior, which makes him an utter pill to be around. All of this racks his consciousness with so much tension that he breaks down and admits that he broke the clock. His grandmother quickly forgives him, his sister gives him a hug and all of the bright orbs that previously revolved around Finn disappear.

The fascinating thing about a great good-night book is that it can be as long or as short as readers or its audience desire. The illustrations, their depth and the things not directly said allow Finn’s Little Fibs to be an illustrated book that could be read once when time is tight or you want to dig into examples. However, the text is also short enough (see: brevity) to where you could read it once, and still have enough gas in the tank to read it again enjoyably.

Actually, every book from Tom Percival in the Big Bright Feeling book series that we’ve read like that falls into this category. Finn’s Little Fibs is no exception and deftly illustrates how one little boy’s lie twists his emotions into a Gordian Knot that can simply be undone by telling the truth. It does this, which is a lesson, but does so in an entertaining manner that will allow young readers to realize that he’s doing the wrong thing, and hopefully prevent, or at least shorten the time when kids do these fibs themselves.

Finn’s Little Fibs is by Tom Percival and is in the Big Bright Feelings Book series, available on Bloomsbury Children’s Books.

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