LITTLE WOLF'S BOOK OF BADNESS

Having actually brushed his teeth and shown other signs of being a “goodie-4-paws,” Little Wolf is dispatched by his concerned parents to Uncle Bigbad’s Cunning College For Brute Beasts (“Our Motto: The Badder the Better”) to learn the Nine Rules of Badness. In a series of letters home, Little Wolf not only protests that it was all a joke, he also recounts a series of daffy incidents, culminating in Uncle Bigbad’s sudden death from standing too close to the fire after a surfeit of “bakebeans.” Little Wolf inherits Uncle Bigbad’s loot and “BAD” badge, but having met a troop of cubs—as in cub scouts—he develops a new code of ethics and a taste for further adventure. Plenty of blots, scratch-outs and simple pen-and-ink drawings give Little Wolf’s letters a suitably disheveled look; readers afflicted with delicate sensitivities need not apply, but fans of Dav Pilkey’s Captain Underpants will be heartily amused by this broad British farce. (Fiction. 9-11)