Guest Author - Sheryl Tilley

I love reading children’s picture books. Many new ones are published each year with the older ones staying in print as long as they can be sold profitably. My favorite picture book is one printed in 1998 - Chocolatina. As you can see by the title, it concerns a subject I can’t imagine being without - chocolate.

Although this book is written at the age level of four to eight year olds, adults will also thoroughly enjoy the story of Chocolatina’s far-fetched predicament. It’s also a great gift book for a fellow chocolate lover.

“You are what you eat.” That’s the favorite saying of Chocolatina’s health teacher, Mrs. Ferdman. Illustrator Denise Brunkus shows us Mrs. Ferdman’s favorite snack - Extra Dry Prunes, propped against the chalkboard next to the dusty erasers.

Chocolatina hears this and bites a chunky piece from a chocolate bunny wishing this would come true. After all, chocolate is what Chocolatina loves more than anything else in the world.

The next morning Chocolatina wakes to find she has turned into a chocolate girl. Her mother doesn’t notice because she’s stationed behind the newspaper at the breakfast table. And the problems that ensue are funny. She gets melted chocolate on her friends at school, she’s so flustered she spells ‘cocoa’ wrong, the principal tries to bite off one of her elbows for dessert at lunchtime and her prune-loving health teacher even tries to bite off a piece of Chocolatina’s ear! That night in bed, Chocolatina cries a chocolate syrup tear and wishes she could just be a normal girl again.

And when she wakes up, she is back to normal. Going down to the kitchen, she finds her favorite chocolate breakfast cereal - Choco-Crunchies. She promises never to eat chocolate again -- starting tomorrow and finishes off the bowl. And on the very last page there is an illustration of Mrs. Ferdman gazing into a bathroom mirror, having turned into chocolate.

As way-out a concept as turning into a chocolate girl is physically, maybe becoming the chocolate’s attributes is a very good thing. Think of a luscious box of fresh premium chocolates and what comes to mind? These things are a few that I thought of:
Kindness
Loving
Giving
Pleasurable
Heartfelt
Sentimental
Thoughtful -- and I could go on.

You can make your own lengthy list of chocolate’s attributes. Then go back over the list and think about what you have written. You’ll find you have lots of memories of chocolate, friends and family attaching themselves to every chosen word. Like chocolate’s flavor -- it’s all good.

Yes, Chocolatina. You can BE what you eat!