Vancouver animator Sean Moore’s second picture book, Veggies Smeggies, revolves around a little boy who monotonously explains to the conniving, vegetable-wielding adults around him why he loathes the green stuff. Only his grandma, with the help of a forced cautionary tale, can cure him of his vegetable hatred. But this story rings false because the text has already established that the boy is too smart to be tricked into eating what’s good for him.

The book is hampered from the start by its stale premise – do we really need another book on fussy eaters? There isn’t enough material for 32 pages; there are only so many ways a boy can repeat that he really hates vegetables. While the same charge could be lodged against Dr. Seuss’s Green Eggs and Ham, at least that classic boasts some funny rhymes and absurd situations. Moore’s book is seriously mundane.

The pedestrian concept is not helped by the clunky verse: “You may ask yourself ‘they’ meaning just who;/Who I mean is our parents, honest and for true.” Not only is this ungrammatical, it doesn’t even scan. This is typical of the whole book. Where Dennis Lee and Loris Lesynski deploy vivid, yucky imagery to enliven similar themes, Moore’s high point is this bald observation about veggies: “You can’t make them fun.” This line is accompanied by an amusing illustration of a desperately grimacing father presenting vegetables disguised as a happy face. Parents will wryly recognize themselves in this pathetic figure.

Moore varies the compositions somewhat, despite the fact that most of the pages depict food being grudgingly consumed or adamantly refused. Generally, though, the stylized illustrations overwhelm the slight text with their garish colours and exaggerated facial expressions.