The Day the Crayons Quit – Best Selling Children’s Picture Book

* “Making a noteworthy debut, Daywalt composes droll missives that express aggravation and aim to persuade, while Jeffers’s (This Moose Belongs to Me) crayoned images underscore the waxy cylinders’ sentiments: each spread features a facsimile of a letter scrawled, naturally, in the crayon’s hue; a facing illustration evidences how Duncan uses the crayon, as in a picture of a giant elephant, rhino, and hippo (Gray laments, ‘That’s a lot of space to color in all by myself’). These memorable personalities will leave readers glancing apprehensively at their own crayon boxes.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review — Publisher’s Weekly

“Jeffers delivers energetic and playful illustrations. The drawings are loose and lively, and with few lines, he makes his characters effectively emote. Clever spreads, such as Duncan’s ‘white cat in the snow’ perfectly capture the crayons’ conundrum, and photographic representations of both the letters and coloring pages offer another layer of texture, lending to the tale’s overall believability. A comical, fresh look at crayons and color.”—Kirkus Reviews

“Fresh and funny. Oliver Jeffers’s quirky, joyful illustrations convey the strength and comedy of the crayons’ sentiments, and children ages 4-8 will laugh in recognition at seeing their own color preferences reflected back at them.”—The Wall Street Journal

“Hilarious. . . Each spread includes a reproduction of an actual letter (written in crayon, of course) on the verso, facing an appropriate composition such as a childlike crayon drawing or a colored-in page from a coloring book. The crayons themselves, with deceptively simple line and dot faces, are rich in emotion and character, and it’s entertaining to consider each crayon’s representation in light of the voice in its letter. While potential lessons in inference, point of view, and persuasive writing abound in the crayons’ letters, this is guaranteed to see just as much use for being just plain fun. Move over, Click, Clack, Moo (BCCB 9/00); we’ve got a new contender for most successful picture-book strike.”—BCCB

Children’s Literature – Ken Marantz and Sylvia Marantz

The rebellion of the crayons is foreshadowed on the jacket/cover as the anthropomorphized crayons scowl in protest. Duncan, a young boy, is surprised to find a series of letters from his crayons when he goes to take them out of their box. Each crayon is then depicted on a double page with a note in its color stating its complaint and sample drawings. Red feels overworked doing fire engines, apples, valentines, and Santa. Purple is glad to be used but is upset when Duncan colors outside the lines. Beige is tired of being second to Brown; Gray is sick of being used for big things like elephants and whales. And so each color states its complaints alongside examples. Blue is almost used up from all the oceans, lakes, etc. Peach is embarrassed because it is naked without its paper wrapping. Duncan answers all their complaints with a solution sure to amuse and perhaps inspire young readers. The crayons, also filling the end pages, are portrayed naturalistically but with stick arms, legs, and features. Their sample illustrations are indeed crayon-made, almost child-like, as are the notes. A couple of pages reproduced from a coloring book add authenticity. Readers may be inspired to produce some notes and examples of their own. Reviewer: Ken Marantz and Sylvia Marantz

School Library Journal

K-Gr 2—In this delightfully imaginative take on a beloved childhood activity, a young boy’s crayons have had enough. Fed up with their workload and eager to voice their grievances, they pen letters to Duncan detailing their frustrations. Energetic and off-the-wall, the complaints are always wildly funny, from the neurotically neat Purple (“If you DON’T START COLORING INSIDE the lines soon… I’m going to COMPLETELY LOSE IT”) to the underappreciated White (“If I didn’t have a black outline, you wouldn’t even know I was THERE!”). Daywalt has an instinctive understanding of the kind of humor that will resonate with young children, such as Orange and Yellow duking it out over which of them represents the true color of the sun or Peach’s lament that ever since its wrapper has fallen off, it feels naked. Though Jeffers’s messily scrawled crayon illustrations are appropriately childlike, they’re also infused with a sophisticated wit that perfectly accompanies the laugh-out-loud text; for example, a letter from Beige, in which he bemoans being tasked with drawing dull items like turkey dinners, is paired with an image of the crestfallen crayon drooping over beside a blade of wheat. Later on, Pink grumbles about constantly being passed over for less-feminine colors while the opposite page depicts a discomfited-looking pink monster and cowboy being derided by a similarly hued dinosaur. This colorful title should make for an uproarious storytime and may even inspire some equally creative art projects.—Mahnaz Dar, Library Journal

Kirkus Reviews

Duncan wants to draw, but instead of crayons, he finds a stack of letters listing the crayons’ demands in this humorous tale. Red is overworked, laboring even on holidays. Gray is exhausted from coloring expansive spaces (elephants, rhinos and whales). Black wants to be considered a color-in color, and Peach? He’s naked without his wrapper! This anthropomorphized lot amicably requests workplace changes in hand-lettered writing, explaining their work stoppage to a surprised Duncan. Some are tired, others underutilized, while a few want official titles. With a little creativity and a lot of color, Duncan saves the day. Jeffers delivers energetic and playful illustrations, done in pencil, paint and crayon. The drawings are loose and lively, and with few lines, he makes his characters effectively emote. Clever spreads, such as Duncan’s “white cat in the snow” perfectly capture the crayons’ conundrum, and photographic representations of both the letters and coloring pages offer another layer of texture, lending to the tale’s overall believability. A comical, fresh look at crayons and color. (Picture book. 3-7)