Slapstick comedy frees this lesson on """"bad"""" words from didacticism; """"A comic but sensible book,"""" said PW. Ages 4-8. (Oct.)

Gr 1-4 A bad word, spoken by a small boy at a fashionable garden party, creates havoc, and the child, Elbert, gets his mouth scrubbed out with soap. The bad word, in the shape of a long-tailed furry monster, will not go away until a wizard-gardener cooks up some really delicious, super-long words that everyone at the party applauds. This single-idea cautionary tale has lively, absurdist pictures of tiara-crowned, formally dressed adults recoiling in horror or cavorting with glee when Elbert, the only child at the party, speaks a word. The transformation of a word into a visible, furry creature, makes its point clearly, but the long words offered as replacement (MY STARS! . . .RATS AND BLUE BLAZES! . . .ZOUNDS AND GADZOOKS!) are as alien to a modern child as the adult garden party with its butler and titled guests. The book may offer a way for adults to tackle the thorny problem of bad language, but good-boy Elbert, with his bow tie and soaped mouth, is unlikely to be a child's favorite story character. Shirley Wilton, Ocean County College, Toms River, N.J.