BOB AND TOM

A couple of turkeys do a whole lot of nothing on the farm.

Bob and Tom are both tom turkeys, and they’re good friends. They’re also…not the sharpest tools in the shed, so to speak. In a sequence of time-stamped episodes, the turkeys get soaked in the rain (“ ‘It’s wet,’ Tom noticed. ‘It’s the water,’ Bob explained”), ponder the contents of their heads, conspire to swipe “a suit that swims” from the clothesline so they can take a dip in the pond, and convince themselves that they’ve lost their names. These absurd little episodes are illustrated with detailed mixed-media pictures that depict the friends as plump, bumbling turkeys (who, oddly, seem to have navels) amid other farm animals and people going about their days in the background. Certain scenes seem a bit overworked, with characters blending in a bit too much with the saturated setting, but the humor will help engage readers. Some of the humor is so understated it may take a while to sink in, as when Tom explains to a cow that their names are “small” and have “a round thing in the middle…like a doughnut.” “What kind of doughnut?” the cow asks. Children will ask their caregivers why they are snickering and be thus ushered into the world of Cazet’s dry wit.

Agreeably silly stuff in the classic noodlehead vein.