Freckled, pale-skinned Chester van Chime is completely discombobulated when he wakes up realizing he's lost the ability to rhyme. In one of this picture book's many clever linguistic misdirections, Monsen (All My Friends Are Dead, for adults) writes, "See, Chester loved rhyming, in poem or song./ It always felt right, but today it felt...//...not right. VERY not right." As Chester makes his way to school, rhymes everywhere seem to taunt him. Gouache and colored pencil art by Hanlon (the Dory Fantasmagory series) depicts a goofy, fairy tale--like landscape defined by visual rhyme gags, including a "Shoe Zoo" (the animals inhabit a giant boot), a goat in a boat, and much more (the endpapers provide clues for any stumpers). Concerned, Chester's classmates try to draw rhymes out, showing him objects associated with a series of words; in Chester's state, however, cat is "tiny lion" and rat is "extra big, mousy-lookin' dude." But on the way home, Chester, relieved and relaxed, has a revelation. His rhyming groove returns as aural fits and starts turn to fluid, welcome rhyme, and the whole town celebrates. What starts out as a book about wordplay turns into an inventive and giggly antidote for the bad-day blues. Ages 4--8. Author's agent: Steven Malk, Writers House. Illustrator's agent: Elena Giovinazzo, Pippin Properties. (Mar.)

Cheerful endpaper illustrations of rhyming word pairs set the stage for this hilarious jab at the nursery-rhyme format. One day, Chester wakes up and discovers he has lost his special talent--he can no longer rhyme! The text quips that "it baffled poor Chester. He felt almost queasy. / To match up two sounds, it was always so . . . / . . . simple for him." A disheartened Chester walks to school through a neighborhood populated by classic European nursery-rhyme and fairy-tale characters--there's a troll under a bridge, a butcher, a baker, a candlestick maker, and more. At school, Chester's classmates try to help him get his rhyming groove back by staging a show and tell with a cat, bat, mat, hat, and even a rat. Poor Chester can only come up with amusing placeholder names--a bat is a "swingy sports stick," a mat is a "muddy foot wipe," and so on. On his way home, he observes community members performing various jobs and has a revelation that puts things in perspective. Monsen's clever text offers both lexical fun and an important lesson: "This too shall pass." Well-timed page turns will have kids shouting out the missing, but easily guessable, end rhymes. Sharp-eyed observers will also notice that the shops in the artwork have rhyming names. Hanlon's busy gouache and colored pencil illustrations are full of attention-grabbing slapstick humor. All characters are light-skinned or ambiguously brown. Get ready for wordplay that's giggly and fun and lasts long after the story is…over, alas. (Picture book. 3-6) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.