K-Gr 2 In this tongue-in-cheek tale, Mr. and Mrs. Dullard take great pride in being humdrum. Family activities include watching paint dry and savoring vanilla ice cream ("Hold the cones. And extract the vanilla"). The Dullards are horrified at exclamation marks, flowered wallpaper, and sociable neighbors bearing gifts of applesauce cake. They try their best to shelter their children from such colorful influences. Away from their parents' watchful gaze, however, Salmieri's colored-pencil illustrations humorously show Blanda, Borely, and Little Dud breaking out of their mild molds by juggling paintbrushes, climbing on clotheslines, and befriending puppies. There are also plenty of sight gags to chuckle at, from the children gathered around an unplugged, blank television screen to piles of plain cardboard boxes full of "gray shirts." VERDICT This title follows in the quirky tradition of Harry Allard's "The Stupids" books (Houghton), with clever wordplay and subversive fun that will appeal to children everywhere. Linda Ludke, London Public Library, Ontario, Canada

Parents used to hearing "This is so boring!" might want to show this worst-case scenario to their kids. Mr. and Mrs. Dullard are trying to raise their three children anda, Borely, and Little Dud their own image: dull as rocks. Horrified upon finding the kids reading books (instead of "nice blank paper"), the family uproots from its lawless neighborhood. (They're still recovering from when the leaves changed color.) Their new house, though, has problems: a neighbor who uses exclamation points in front of the kids, and a room ace yourself inted bright yellow. So the family hurries off to buy some beige-gray paint and, you guessed it, watch it dry. The real story, however, plays in the edges: the three kids taking every opportunity to scurry away from their stultifying parents and cavort, climb, and cackle. Pennypacker packs the pages full of winning jokes ("Five vanilla cones, please. Hold the cones. And extract the vanilla"), while Salmieri's colored-pencil art creates a perfectly monotonous world of straight angles and nondescript coloring. Rarely has boring been this boisterous. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Both Pennypacker (the Clementine books) and Salmieri (Dragons Love Tacos, 2012) are best-sellers. Dull as it is, this ought to sell well, too.