Edwardo: The Horriblest Boy in the Whole Wide World (review)

Edwardo doesn't start out as the horriblest boy, but when his youthful excesses ("Like most children, Edwardo made a lot of noise") are greeted with firm pronouncements about his nature ("You are the noisiest boy in the whole wide world"), they fix his character until he's a true horror. When by happenstance his actions begin to be seen as praiseworthy (he rudely shoves a kid, accidentally pushing him out of the way of a plummeting lamp, and gets applauded for his quick thinking), that response shapes his behavior positively ("From then on, Edwardo looked after the little children"), eventually turning him into "the nicest boy in the whole world." This is more a fable than a story, and youngsters may be intrigued by the notion of some fairly easy shifts from bad kid to good kid. Ultimately, though, this is a lesson for adults rather than kids, since it's both pointedly didactic and simplistic in its halo-effect-takes-all approach to behavior, and there's really not enough information about Edwardo himself and his feelings to elicit empathy. Burningham's art displays his familiar energetically scribbled lines touched with daubs of lively color and floating in white space; the illustrations emphasize the message by repeated horizontals of adults pointing accusingly at Edwardo in the first half and extending their hands in praise and friendship to him in the second. The art's the strongest element here, though; this bogs down in its moralizing, and kids would be better off with Burningham classics such as Mr. Gumpy's Outing (BCCB 1/72).