One Potato Review

Chrysanthemum is clearly a less belligerent cousin of Henkes’ Lilly who also – irrepressibly – loves going to school, but is willing to throw some brickbats along the way, either that or she cannot help herself. Chrysanthemum is made of softer stuff, but this author is rarely content to talk down to his readers, and as always there’s someone around to blurt out what everyone is thinking – in this case her parents: “They’re just jealous,” says her mother about the knuckleheads at school who would think to make fun of her name. “And envious and begrudging and discontented and jaundiced,” adds her father. These books are like that: literate, and not afraid to take sides. For many ages.