Twimericks: The Book of Tongue-Twisting Limericks »

Lou Brooks is a renowned illustrator and comic artist whose work ranges from updating the "little guy in the top hat" logo design for the game Monopoly to, most recently, the '50s pulp-fiction-style illustrations for The Book of Totally Irresponsible Science. He has also designed and illustrated covers for Time and Newsweek, and in the 1970s created a comic strip for Playboy that achieved a cult following. He lives with his wife in a cabin in the woods several hours north of San Francisco.

Pure nuttiness: the Twimerick, a fiendish confection of limerick plus tongue-twister, topped off by the deliciously whacky illustrations of its inventor, Lou Brooks. To wit (and to be read out loud quickly):

A petulant flatulent
platypus starts,
To tooting and flouting his flute to his farts,
But at platypus outings,
His flatulent floutings,
Flout his flute flat at the
tootiest parts.

Nonsensical whimsy—or whimsical nonsense—Twimericks are a form of wordplay that are irresistible for kids, as well as for grown-ups unafraid to be silly; perfect to be read at parties or in a classroom when learning poetry (that’s right, who knew poetry could be so much fun?). And the book itself, like the best poetry collections, is a gem offering one Twimerick per page, each illustrated in full-color by the author, a legendary commercial artist. Open to any page and feel the unbridled creative energy spilling out. It's pure happiness.

School Library Journal

Gr 2–4—In this slim collection of lighthearted verse, Brooks fuses limericks and tongue twisters to create 30 "twimericks," including "Which Witch Was Which?": "Two witchy witches in a Wichita ditch,/One witch with a twitch caused the witches to switch,/The spell they were under,/Caused people to wonder,/Which Wichita witch switched was which?" The results are broadly humorous and frequently gross, as in "A Flatulent Platypus" and "Frankly, Frank Fankley," which centers on a snot-filled hanky. The manic, exaggerated cartoons perfectly complement the silly goings-on. This is a far cry from Edward Lear, but it should prove popular with fledgling readers who are discovering nonsense wordplay for the first time.—Marilyn Taniguchi, Beverly Hills Public Library, CA