Book Review: Go Away Big Green Monster

Go Away, Big Green Monster by Ed Emberley is a book I came across when teaching my old toddler class.  It was one of my safe bets for circle time; I never met a two year old yet who didn't like it.  When I had my own son, it was one of the first books I bought for him.

The feature of the book are die-cut pages, and through their holes, the face of the monster gradually appears, while the text underneath describes him.  So page one: "Big Green Monster has two big yellow eyes," Page two says "a long bluish-greenish nose," etc.

For this first half of the book the pages are black, but once the monster's head is fully revealed, we get this text: "YOU DON'T SCARE ME!  So GO AWAY, scraggly purple hair!"  And you turn over to a purple page and a smaller cut-out.

The text keeps ordering features to go away, and the cut-out keeps getting smaller until only the pupils of the eyes are left, with the final command beneath: "GO AWAY, Big Green Monster!"  Turning this last page brings you to the jet black inside cover of the book, with the text: "and DON'T COME BACK!"  Beneath, in smaller, green print: "Until I say so."

The simple art style and bold, contrasting colours would make this a good book for babies--if you can find a board book version!  I've only seen paper ones, and accordingly, I've not tried it on a child younger than one.  I think it would make a brilliant board book though, since babies love books with holes.  Even now, my daughter likes to poke her fingers at the monster's eyes and "sharp white teeth."

It's also very short, taking only a couple of minutes to read, and with repetitive text which makes it ideal for toddlers.  The cut-outs will fascinate older children too, and I have used this in a mixed age circle though I wouldn't recommend it particularly for three year olds and up.

Notes for the Parent

The monster in the book is by necessity very cartoonish and not remotely scary.  Although there is the one line: "YOU DON'T SCARE ME!" there is no suggestion of why the narrator might be scared of the monster.  That said, the definite implication is that monsters are scary.

The tagline on the front cover says "Make your fears disappear!" and this is obviously targeted at children who imagine monsters in the dark to help them get over their fear.  The potential problem here is that the toddlers who I recommend this book for are generally too young to be afraid of the dark These kinds of fears generally start around two or three, according to WebMD; my son, at three and a half has yet to exhibit that kind of anxiety.

The fact that the book's message might go over your children's heads isn't going to spoil their enjoyment of it in the least.  The only potential problem here is, as I said above, it suggests the idea that monsters are scary.  I personally doubt it would start a fear of the dark in a child, but if you're trying to avoid any sort of "toddler-horror", this might not be the book for you.

Educational Stuff

Obviously, if your child is afraid of the dark, even if they're past their toddler years, they might find this book useful.

I personally use it for teaching the parts of the face.  When reading the story in a circle, I would point to my eyes, nose, mouth, etc.  Most of the children would automatically mimic me with much giggling.  Reading it to my children, I touch their own facial features and those on the pages.

Most of the pages mention colours too, but it's not really the best book for that, since the range is a little limited: white, red, yellow, green, purple, and... 'bluish-greenish'.  Vocabulary in general is limited ('big' is used for the monster, his eyes, his mouth and his face) and descriptive rather than useful ('scraggly' and 'squiggly').

That's not the point, of course.  The book is meant to be simple and striking and it achieves that wonderfully.  In my opinion, every toddler should have this book!


For grown-up reading, I make the late-to-the-party recommendation of the Hunger Games series.  You've probably heard of it, and while no phenomenon is really worth its hype, it does make for a great read.  The final book, Mockingjay, has a very different feel to the other two, and seems to divide its fans.  I personally love it, and love that the author didn't cop out in favour of more conventional story-telling tropes.  Being a young adult series, it's reasonably short and simple too, which is always good for my toddler-induced-exhaustion.