Maya Makes a Mess: Toon Books Level 2 - Hardcover

Rutu Modan is an Israeli illustrator and comic book artist. She is a graduate of the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem, and former editor of the Hebrew edition of MAD magazine. She, and former MAD colleague Yirmi Pinkus, founded Actus Tragicus, a publishing collective of Israeli comic book artists in 1995. She is also the recipient of multiple artistic awards, including the Israel Museum’s Young Artist of the Year” (1997) and Best Illustrated Children’s Book” (1998, 2000, 2002) prizes, the Israel Cultural Excellence Foundation’s designated Outstanding Artist” (2005), and the Will Eisner Comic Industry Award for her book Exit Wounds in 2008. In 2012, she released Maya Makes a Mess with TOON Books, the first children’s book she both wrote and illustrated. Her most recent comic, "The Property," was released by Drawn and Quarterly in May 2013.

Maya’s table manners are just terrible, so when she’s invited to dine with the queen, there is due cause for concern. When the offerings at the banquet run to such child-unfriendly choices as snail salad, ham jelly, and spinach juice, the frank and confident Maya asks to be provided with pasta and ketchup instead. The queen, rather than being offended, finds Maya’s approach to mealtime charming and, corgi at her side, takes bad dining manners to the outer limits before declaring that all will eat Maya’s way—but only on holidays. Modan’s beautifully expressive clear-line cartoons work well in a story for children, and the story itself has just the right twists for new readers to enjoy and maybe even hazard a chance of predicting. In addition to mealtime scenes, we travel with Maya by airplane to visit the queen, and the number of visual riffs on British ceremony and high etiquette gives much for the reader to explore, along with the accessible text. Another winner from TOON. Preschool-Grade 2. --Francisca Goldsmith