Little Trouble in Tall Tree

In the beautiful town of Tall Tree, the babies inhabit a secret world that their parents are unaware of. It is a land of infant gangsters, baby hoodlums if you will, and different gangs control different areas. Mama’s Boy is a new recruit into the gang of Squeezy the Cheeks, the North Wood Gang. Mama’s Boy has an unparalleled talent for throwing tantrums, and Squeezy has plans to utilize this skill for a heist that will scare off a rival gang, the Poopypants Gang. But Mama’s Boy is a bit unsure of himself, and a new girl he meets at Story Time might distract him when the time comes.

Michael Fertik has entered new territory with Little Trouble in Tall Tree. He names his new genre a “baby noir mystery.” The story is written in a pseudo-noir style, but the stars are all infants, whose gangster-like intentions are frequently accompanied by decidedly baby-like actions such as spitting up, waving arms and legs around, and crapping in diapers. The characters feature such classy names as Sammy the Whine and Harry the Rash. The story, which revolves around a plan to steal expressed milk from a breastfeeding class, is a bit short on substance, although the illustrations are cute. A book like this will only really appeal to a very niche group of readers; most of those will probably be parents themselves, but the special breed of humor in this story will definitely not appeal to everyone. Some may find the mix of old-school mystery with baby mannerisms to be a bit strange, while the price seems a bit steep for the content. But for the right reader, Little Trouble in Tall Tree is a fresh idea waiting to be discovered.