WINCHELL MINK: The Misadventure Begins

On the eve of his 12th birthday, perennial doormat Winchell Mink decides it's time to stop hiding from the bullies who routinely pummel him and "experience life" in this absurd tale. His first stop: "that cliff" his mother has repeatedly warned him not to visit. Naturally, Winchell falls (or is he pushed by his nemesis?), landing on a ledge below. At this point, the narrative falls off a cliff of its own, or perhaps down a rabbit hole, as Winchell switches bodies with his enchanted pet turtle, Hannibal, who witnessed his plunge. Without explanation, Winchell then transmogrifies into a baseball-playing dinosaur, back to a turtle, then to a kindergartner with a plunger-shaped bottom, and again back to a turtle whose life-changing conversation with Abraham Lincoln convinces him, "me's the only me to be." Ultra-short chapters and whole pages with a single BAM! in extra-large font make this a painless read, as long as puberty is still some time in the future. The author pitches some of the humor (such as Winchell's musing that his adventure was cooked up by a hack writer who "needed to fill enough pages so that his publisher wouldn't reduce his pay") squarely at adults. But that audience won't find the naughty words, toilet humor and the depiction of kindergarten as a nest of merciless thugs nearly as funny as their kids might. This ought to circulate well on the school bus. Ages 8-12. (May)