Book Review: Dinosaur v. Bedtime

For reasons that should be obvious, my reading habits are about to change. Radically. I suppose at first, it really doesn't matter what I read to our baby, since the phone book will serve just as well to accustom her to my voice as any work by Dr. Seuss. Still, my wife has drawn the line at Dostoevsky. She has a point - driving my daughter into depressive fits of alcoholism before her baby teeth come in would probably not win me Father of the Year. I figure that while she's still figuring out the whole concept of language, I can read her some of my own personal favorites (The Hobbit, anyone?), but once she is beginning to understand and pay attention to more than the sound of my voice, it is time for something more age appropriate.

To that end, my wife and I have started accumulating a small collection of children's books, through gifts and select purchases. We have even begun trying out a few of them on our yet unborn child, just trying to guage her interest. Okay, really it's more about my interest at this point. I'm trying to figure out which books are going to be fun to read to our kid, and which ones I will make my wife read to her.

Kidding.

We recently came across a very colorful board book called Dinosaur v. Bedtime. I'd share the cover, but copyright lawsuits against crappy blogs no one actually reads are all the rage these days, so I'll pass on that unless the publisher emails me permission after reading this rad review ("Bueller? Bueller?"). We found it while perusing a book store one day, and knew after one read through we had to have it for our baby. Well, for me, at least. The main character is a dinosaur. He roars on every page. He battles bowls of spaghetti, boring adults, and inevitably (warning: spoiler ahead), bedtime. Infinite possibilities for roaring noises and fun voices abound.

While the limitations of the little Dinosaur's language imbues this work with a rich sense of pathos, the real value of this work is in the subtle subtext.
... aaaand that's enough of THAT kind of review.

After spotting the book in the store, we decided to hold off for a little while (we were only about four months along at that point). Then I decided to buy it for my wife as part of her birthday present. Yes, I bought my wife a present for our child, which was really for me, on her birthday. I am just like those guys that get their wife a vacuum for valentine's day. Fortunately, my wife is not only smart, beautiful, funny, and good and growing human beings, she is also gracious. In fact, she admitted to me that she had also bought the book, for me, for Father's Day. Obviously, great minds think alike.

We took the book for a spin, with me reading to Ashley's belly. It was a little odd, at first, but the more granola-oriented pregnancy books all say this is fine idea. Who am I to argue? The baby certainly seemed to enjoy it - she danced, kicked, and punched every time the little dinosaur in the book roared. So either she loves the book, and we've got a early favorite for the bedtime story arms race, or I've managed to terrify my daughter in utero. Good days work in either case.

In conclusion, I will sum up my review of this book thusly: Reading Dinosaur v. Bedtime to my unborn child caused her to kick the sh** out of my wife. That's good enough for me.