A Little Bit of Oomph! is spirited, creative fun for all

A Little Bit of Oomph is the latest book by Barney Saltzberg.  It’s a sequel of sorts to Beautiful Oops!, a book that explored the possibilities of things that can happen when you make a mistake.  A Little Bit of Oomph! takes that lesson of learning and simply asks the question what would happen if you did it just a bit differently?

Saltzberg is one of those authors that like Karma Wilson.  You probably have a book or two of theirs in your children’s book collection, but you may struggle to recall their name.  Both authors have a very distinctive style, recurring characters and do a nice job a teaching children’s lessons.

A Little Bit of Oomph! is similar to Saltzbert’s other books in that each page is very dreamy, a little bit trippy, artsy and atmospheric feel about it.  Each page is very different and asks readers to look beyond what they see on the page.

For example when you see a picture of a dog it has a book on his tail with the words “Transform a fun tail into…” on one page.  Open the book on the dog’s tail and it’s a smaller book entitled A Funny Tale.

This is a silly book that kids 4 and up will laugh at and enjoy reading over.  Some of the words may be too difficult for them to read without help.  One of the lessons that A Little Bit of Oomph! can teach is that of trying, never giving up and perseverance.

Perseverance is a big word.  It’s an even bigger word to a 4 year old, but the lessons that it teaches are ones that you want them to learn.  Oomph is perseverance.  As a parent it’s difficult to leach them to say, much less understand perseverance, but oomph, they can understand quickly.  A Little Bit of Oomph! is a good, creative shortcut that’ll help kids understand that going that extra effort can be fun.