This is Not My Hat
by Jon Klassen
Age: 3 +
Interests: fish, mystery, crime and punishment, ocean
Candlewick Press: 2012
33 pp.
Also by this author: I Want My Hat Back
A little fish has stolen the hat of a big fish. As he swims away he is entirely unrepentant, thinking he will get away with it. And as he lists the reasons why the big fish will never catch him, we see events unfolding completely opposite to his plan.
Not a sequel to I Want my Hat Back (for starters, it’s an entirely different hat), this book is rather a variation on a theme. This time the story is told from the point of view of the perpetrator,but the outcome is the same. Justice prevails, and the lesson once again is this: if you wrong those higher on the food chain, prepare to be lunch.
With the same deadpan humour but a slightly more complex storyline, this book will delight everyone who loved Klassen’s other hat book. In addition to the satisfying sense of vengeance, young readers will delight in seeing little fish’s plans falling apart. Wishful thinking certainly doesn’t help him any. And central to his downfall is the trustworthiness of the lobster. Seriously, friends: never trust a lobster.
In the dark depths of the ocean, the setting is even more foreboding. The big fish swims into the jungle of vegetation after the little fish, and when he swims out again he has his hat back. Little fish’s fate is implied.
Dark, funny, crazily satisfying fable of crime and punishment.
Related: Maclean’s interview with Jon Klassen
(this title available at amazon.com)
Rarest Kind of Best 