GREENAWAY MEDAL WINNER – 2000
I Will Not Ever Never Eat a Tomato
aka I Will Never Not Ever Eat a Tomato (American title)
by Lauren Child
London: Orchard Books, 2000
30 pages
Age: 3 +
Interests: food, picky eaters, mealtime, siblings
Also by this author: Clarice Bean novels, Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Book?, The Princess and the Pea
Charlie sometimes has to give his little sister Lola her dinner. Which is hard, because she is very, very picky. One day he decides to play a little trick on her, and makes up new identities for all the food on her plate. (The carrots are now orange twiglets from Jupiter, the peas are green drops from Greenland…) Not only does Lola go along with the fun, but she does some ‘rebranding’ as well, insisting at the end that the tomatoes are actually “moonsquirters”… her favourite food. End result: the children have a giggle and Lola eats her dinner.
For picky eaters everywhere. Anyone familiar with the Charlie and Lola series will know that Lola is a quirky, funny, stubborn little girl and Charlie is the most patient, thoughtful and lovng big brother in the world. And Lauren Child’s collage illustrations are freewheeling and fun.
NB. This title can also be found as I Will Never Not Ever Eat a Tomato, presumably the American title. Child’s Charlie and Lola characters starred in an animated television series and a number of spinoff books are available based on the series scripts, though these were not written or illustrated by Child.
Rarest Kind of Best 