A hungry cave boy uses his very limited vocabulary to pester his elders, who are all too busy to feed him. He goes hunting for food, and encounters various animals, who give him convincing reasons why he can't eat them. At last, he finds a mammoth who is as hungry as he is and together they go foraging for a food that doesn't talk back to them.

Review: This book is a lot of fun to read, if you don't object to its caveman grammar. Because of its very few words ('Me hungry!' 'Me busy!') the reader works out a great deal of the story from the pictures, and the simplicity makes the book humourous and appeals to the imagination more than it would with longer sentences.

The story focuses on independence and self-reliance -- the boy can't get anything from the busy grownups so he goes out on his own -- and the importance of friendship and working together.

South African writer and illustrator Jeremy Tankard uses bold and energetic brush strokes, with lovely variation of line. The pleasing roughness of their texture contrasts with the simple Photoshop coloured backgrounds, which have only a little dappling. Looking at Tankard's website portfolio, this reviewer would have liked to have seen a bit more of his textures in the backgrounds, but admits the simplicity of the pages is striking.

 If readers like the prehistoric theme, a book which explores more of its practicalities is Satoshi Kitamura's 'Stone Age Boy'. But where Kitamura's book is is somewhat serious in tone, this book is a good romp and will make readers laugh.

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2008-10-06