Summer Reading: Hookitty-Tookitty-Tah

We are in the middle of celebrating numerous birthdays this month and it seems the perfect time to review a book about sweets!

Hookity-Tookity-Tah, written by Antonio Mugica and illustrated by Hermann Mejía was sent to me to review by Hunter Hackett of the La Jolla Writer’s Conference.

This is a story about a town with a dragon problem. To prevent the dragon from eating the villagers, the King negotiates a deal to provide the dragon with “One thousand pies! One hundred cakes! And then a bonbon wagon!” to fill him up instead.

Without giving it all away, there are a few culinary disasters along the way and a nutritional message.

The story is imaginative and fun and the illustrations are wonderful, bright and detailed with a sense of whimsy to them. The King, for example has the body of a cupcake and the desserts made for the dragon look deliciously surreal. You will never find desserts quite like these 50 foot cakes with towering piles of frosting. The characters use pulleys and ropes to cope with the massive scale of the sweets.

The author, Antonio Mugica, is a man of many talents. His day job is serving as CEO of Smartmatic, an international voting software company that appears to produce many of the electronic voting machines we use here in the United States. He is also a musician and bilingual(!) writer.

The illustrator, Hermann Mejía, has won international awards for his caricature drawing. This is a 35-minute video of him presenting to the International Society of Caricature Artists with several examples of his incredible work. At the 31 minute mark he shows some illustrations from Hookity-Tookity-Tah and then shows a short video of him painting.

Hookity-Tookity-Tah is a treat much like the sugary sweets it depicts.  It is fun and engaging and perfect for summer reading.  

*Disclosure: I was provided a free review copy of the book.