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  • The Beatles Were Fab (And They Were Funny) by Kathleen Krull
  • Elizabeth Bush
Krull, Kathleen . The Beatles Were Fab (And They Were Funny); written by Kathleen Krull and Paul Brewer; illus. by Stacy Innerst. Harcourt, 2013. 34p. ISBN 978-0-547-50991-4 $16.99 R Gr. 3-5.

Yes, sadly, we have now reached the point at which the Beatles need to be explained, and Krull, with her well-trained eye for the foibles of the famous, effectively captures the lads' charm and the insanity that accompanied their most manic performing years. In this picture-book group biography, the Beatles' collectively wry sense of humor is as defining a characteristic as skinny ties and mop tops, and Krull allots space in her text for each of the performers to re-quote some of his sassier lines. ("Q: What do you do when you're cooped up in a hotel room? George: We ice-skate"). Coverage is limited to the frantic period of Beatlemania, with a quick nod to what went before (the Quarry Men, Hamburg, etc.) and what came after ("As they wrote songs that dug deeper into the meaning of life and love, their music was becoming too complicated to perform live"). Innerst's playful, spot-on caricatures (the big-headed Beatles resemble bobbleheads) and imaginative scene-setting, richly [End Page 424] textured in acrylic and ink, add enjoyable atmosphere. Though fans may bristle over what's missing from the appended timeline (Pete Best, for one thing), the chronology and additional bibliography will give readers more context. Grandparents and near-retirement educators will join kids in giggling over Krull's playful jibes at the starstruck fans and may have a few stories of their own about the Fab Four.

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