Gargantua (Jr!): Defender of Earth

Readers will be immediately captivated as the story opens with the young narrator, Gargantua Jr., announcing “I want to grow up to be just like my mom.” The first colourful full-page spread illustration of a small, green lizard-like monster presenting a bouquet of trees to a much larger mom sets the stage for an engaging, simple story. Gargantua Sr., a ‘wild’ monster as depicted in an old newspaper clipping before her little one came along, now fixes rather than destroys cities, protects Earth from space robots and falling asteroids and knocks down old buildings. Gargantua Jr. feels left out of the action and wants to help mom. One morning, the little monster sneaks off to do just that. Fortunately mom arrives in time to prevent a disaster.

Gargantua (Jr.) Defender of Earth by award-winning author/illustrator Kevin Sylvester provides the young audience with a delightful story with large, bold comic book style illustrations that provide details to the setting and characters as a well as complement the simple text. Children will marvel at Gargantua Sr.’s exploits and will also relate to the little monster’s frustration at being unable to help. Sylvester’s clever solutions will please any reader who connects to being ‘left out’ of exciting situations.

Not only is Gargantua (Jr.) Defender of Earth an engaging and fun story, but the picture-text presentation adds details and inferences that captures the attention of readers of all ages. For adults, there is the nostalgic connection to Godzilla type movies as well as Gargantua Sr.’s demonstrated parenting strategies. The details within the illustrations, such as the helicopter hovering over the city, complete with its own speech bubble, and the subtle assortment of interesting setting features, such as the construction site vehicles and the ‘tugboat ‘ submarines with a variety undersea marine life that highlight the size perspective of mom and the robots, draw the reader into a deeper connection to the story.

A great book to share as a read aloud, Gargantua (Jr.) Defender of Earth is also a book that will draw young readers to revisit it again and again to explore the visual elements that the comic book style brings to the story.