Creepy Books

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Creepy.” The promt is: This week, show us something creepy — because hey, we can’t take photos of rainbows and puppies every day. Well, okay, I guess we can. But let’s branch out anyway!

Today’s challenge for blogging 101 was to take a prompt and make it personal. It is a bit hard to make anything personal when you are in a hot and humid room with two fans on, just blowing warm air around. To give you a taste of what it is like today. It is nice warm and sunny, with a bit of smog thanks to the north winds blowing the smoke from the Northern California fires over here. In addition, it is 100 degrees Fahrenheit or about 37 – 38 degrees Celcius (thank you Google for your conversions) with a 15% humidity. I’m not use to humidity. This is the first summer of my life that I have experience any form of humidity and I hate it. All I want to do is to take a shower and go to bed. I can care less about shopping for food for the following week. It is not rainbows and puppies, it is Hell.

However, I thought this prompt would be easy and inspirations would be numerous. I made the mistake of googling “creepy books” thinking nothing can be creepier than some of the already questionable published books for children. For example…

,

Not that bad…

(Focus on the first book for the following books below.)

Okay?… A little weird.

And last but not least…

I cannot help but wonder what lessons these books hold. However, I still cannot fathom the inspiration that the person must have to write any of these books, especially the last one.

The first book, It Hurts When I Poop, makes sense. It is a book about helping children gaining their confidence to use the potty (it says so on the cover). The cover art bothers me. I am not a fan of the girl and the dino together in the bathroom so close. I have never succeeded pooing when anything is on my lap.

The second book, Polly Paints a Penis, also makes sense in the idea that children who love art tend to draw interesting content (I am hoping that is what the book is about), but if you are having problems with your child drawing inappropriate pictures, I believe that telling them would be better than a story. With all the child development classes that I have taken, I can tell you small children are concrete learners and require direct instruction, not the indirect story instruction. I still cannot help but wonder how this got published.

Finally, the last book, Why Mommy Poisoned You, is the creepiest of them all. Not only am I wondering what happened for the author to feel as though there is a purpose and a need to write a book like this, but I cannot help but wonder why everyone is smiling on the cover. If the child just got poisoned, why is everyone smiling? This image will never exist, whether it is today society or during the 1950’s (I believe the book is written then based on the cover art). However, I would like to tell you one of my experiences of a creepy/ inappropriate book.

I want to give a little background story with this book. During the time I was studying to be a teacher, I was helping a first-grade teacher out. Their reading program was designed to have these little books for the kids to take home at the end of the week. However, when I got to see these books, I was introduced to a very interesting book/story. The first time I heard a child reading this book I tried not to laugh, I ended up failing because the student was asking me if I was alright. After a few times of hearing this story, I decided to go up to the teacher. I gave her a list of students of her strong readers and her not so strong readers. She was impressed that I was able to tell with the high success rate. In addition, I asked her if the company was serious when they published that book. Not only was this story ridiculously inappropriate, for older minds (I generally do not follow the twisted mindset), but there were grammar mistakes that six-year-olds were correcting. I could not help but wonder about the intelligence of these textbook corporations if they were making mistakes that first graders were correcting them. How did this get passed, and why?

To give you an idea I will first “read” you the story. After the story has been read, I would like for you to jot down a few words about the story. After which, I will post the book below and you may read the story and look at the pictures. PLEASE put your thoughts down below. I would love to know what you are thinking and feeling about this.

Guss and Fluff

Guss and Fluff live in a fun place. It has many nuts.

Guss and Fluff sit on nuts.

Guss and Fluff hang nut up. 

Gus and Fluff eat nuts.

“Let us go out,” said Gus.

“Yes,” said Fluff.

“Let us get nuts!”

How did you enjoy the little story? What did you think? Take the time to write down what you think. Blow is the story. Just click on the images to enlarge each picture.

I do hope that you enjoyed this little post. It was fun mixing things up. I really do want to know about your thoughts on this topic. Hope to see you soon and happy reading!