Review by Ed Quillen
Pets – January 2008 – Colorado Central Magazine
Humphrey Lee Bogart
by Phil Klingsmith
Illustrations by Abby Robinson
Published in 2007 by Dunsmith Publishing House, Gunnison
ISBN pending
WITHOUT CHILDREN at hand, it’s difficult to review a children’s book in light of its intended audience. Typical of the genre, this one is short (only 13 pages) and filled with large, cute illustrations of its protagonist, a yellow Labrador retriever named “Bo,” short for Humphrey Lee Bogart.
Basically, Bo shows us around his house and introduces the other residents, some of them fellow canines, and then goes for a ride to visit relatives. Like a good Colorado mountain dog, he rides in the back of the pickup.
That’s about the size of the story. As an adult reader, I felt a little disappointed. There’s no drama, no adventure, no challenge. Bo didn’t jump out of the pickup and get injured or left behind. He doesn’t tip over trash cans. He never chases a car or jumps the fence or digs out a flowerbed.
Children’s stories frequently feature an animal behaving badly and learning a valuable lesson the hard way — presumably because presenting the animal’s woes is intended to teach kids a lesson the easy way. But this tale offers no lessons, and no “moral of the story.”
I kept expecting Bo to act like a dog and provide some mischief and suspense, but it never happened. Children may feel differently, though, and find a lot more in Bo’s day than I did.
At the end of this short tale, Klingsmith tells us to “expect more stories from Bo in the future,” and in that case, this isn’t a bad introduction, providing that Bo at least chases a cat or encounters a skunk the next time we meet him.
