The Mellops Strike Oil, Tomi Ungerer

I have to confess that Tomi Ungerer's work has not been on my radar. A few weeks ago I bought this book at a thrift store when the offbeat title caught my attention. I had no idea that Ungerer has a following and that his 80th birthday was coming up. This week it seemed that book blogs everywhere were posting about Tomi Ungerer and then I remembered the book and dug it out of my pile of to be posted's.

The story starts with Mr. Mellops and sons Ferdinand, Casimir, Felix and Isidor going on a bike ride. Father becomes suspicious that there may be oil in the area after tasting water from a brook. This leads to research, the building of a derrick and mayhem. Not your standard children's picture book, but very entertaining.

The Mellops strike oil and things are going well until the family dog is catapulted by an oil jet. Then everything goes bad.

After reading my first Tomi Ungerer book, I now understand the appeal of his work. I'm just happy that as a newbie I could post this book.   # : > ) 

Happy Birthday to You, Tomi Ungerer!