My Big Fat Smelly Poo Diary – at a glance
The School Reading Lists’ five word review: Toilet humour, relationships, comic books.
Children’s book title: My Big Fat Smelly Poo Diary.
Children’s author: Jim Smith.
Genre: Children’s fiction; humour.
Published by: Scholastic.
ISBN: 9780702334474.
Recommended for children aged: 7+ year-olds.
First published: Paperback August 2024.
This children’s book is ideal for: anyone who enjoys laugh-out-loud toilet humour and stories with a message told in a lighthearted way.
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Our review:
Pedro’s teacher has set a class assignment of writing a diary for a year, but what should he write about? The title of this book sort of gives that away because Pedro is obsessed with poo! He and his friends, Olga and Ozzy, are the only members of the Poopies, and for Pedro, the highlight of his day is the break-time toilet inspection!
Over the course of three stories, Pedro tries to win a competition, goes on a day out with his dad, and has to deal with a new boy in his class. The humour works well alongside the serious messages in each story, and this bright and simply drawn comic book should be popular with children of all ages and abilities.
Our verdict:
My Big Fat Smelly Poo Diary is a book to make parents shudder and children laugh out loud! The humour is pretty much all poo related both in words and illustrations and the book would be suitable for confident and reluctant readers alike.
The relationships throughout are positive, with the usual disagreements and misunderstandings between friends and family being dealt with in humorous and engaging ways. The artwork is eye-catching and relatable and should appeal to younger readers as well as those at the upper end of the age range. It is also simple enough, for the most part, to be imitated.
Teaching points and book club discussion ideas:
- The comic book style could be used for students to write their own diaries, perhaps as a cross-curricular activity with an art project.
- Does the artwork make you want to read this book more or less than a regular book?
- This is a humorous book, do you find it funny? Is it easy to write something to make others laugh?
- If you had to describe the different styles used in comic books, what category would Jim Smith’s work fall under?
- How many different styles of comic book can you think of?
- What popular comic book characters have transferred successfully to blockbuster films? Would Pedro and his friends work well on the big screen?
Many thanks to Scholastic for the review copy.
To order a class set of this book, please click below to order via uk.bookshop.org, an organisation that supports local bookshops, or Amazon.co.uk.
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If you like My Big Fat Smelly Poo Diary by Jim Smith you might also like: our reviews of Poo in the Zoo: The Super Pooper Road Race by Steve Smallman and Ada Grey, I Really, Really Need a Poo by Karl Newson and Duncan Beedie and Monster Stink by Anna Brooke.
Browse our graphic novels for KS2.
