From everyday routines to epic adventures in a nanosecond!
Author: Saara Kekäläinen
Illustrator: Reetta Niemensivu
Finnish original: Valpuri ja hirmuinen hammashässäkkä
Publisher: Tammi, 2023
Genre: children’s illustrated fiction
Number of pages: 48 pp.
Reading material: Finnish original, English translation
Rights sold: Korea, Korean Studies Information; Latvia, Latvijas Mediji
When Penelope brushes her teeth, action abounds. Before long the bathroom is awash in toothpaste! Then one of Penelope’s teeth starts to wiggle, and her imagination takes flight. Maybe she’ll be sent a new sheep instead of a new tooth? Or maybe she’ll receive a visit from the tooth fairy’s mischievous cousin, the tooth imp?
Penelope is a lovable, pint-sized bundle of energy whose boundless imagination inevitably transforms the most mundane tasks into astounding adventures. Penelope and the Big Baby Tooth Ballyhoo is the second work in a new series of picture books that began with Penelope and the Perilous Porridge, in which this intrepid heroine brought her breakfast to heel – meanwhile earning a nomination for the Finlandia Junior Prize.
“Then Penelope remembered. She’d heard people were born without teeth, then got baby teeth, which were replaced by permanent teeth. And if you ate too much candy, you had a set of false teeth to look forward to.
Did the same thing also go for, say, feet?
It was perfectly plausible that babies were born without feet, grew baby feet, exchanged them for permanent teeth, and eventually ended up with false feet.
The neighbor’s baby always rode in a carriage, with no feet in sight. Was that because the wee one hadn’t had time to grow them yet? ”
Translated by Kristian London
Also available:
Penelope and the Perilous Porridge (2022)
Penelope and the Curious Clothing Commotion (2023)
The Princess Who Did a Runner (2022)
About the author:
Saara Kekäläinen