I Love You More Than Moldy Ham

A furry, bulbous monster is preparing a feast—how better to show you care?—and the ingredient list offers gross-out gags aplenty as it parodies soppy, feel-good picture books: “Toenails, fungus, beetle knees,/ vulture vomit, thick headcheese./ I love you more than toadstool jam—/ more than chunks of moldy ham!” With an item missing, the monster heads out to find it, but the interlude feels tacked onto a story that is at its best when it’s reveling in the squicky details of everything that goes into the monster’s creation, a sort of blobby, translucent green cake: “Happily we sit to eat./ Dinner smells like sweaty feet!” Armstrong-Ellis (Ten Creepy Monsters) fills the pages with slime and sludge, and careful readers will even spy monster-themed parodies of works from da Vinci, Cassatt, George Rodrigue, and other artists. Ages 4–8. (Aug.)