One Word From Sophia by Jim Averbeck illustrated by Yasmeen Ismail

One Word From Sophia by Jim Averbeck illustrated by Yasmeen Ismail
August 2015 Simon & Schuster

Blurb:

Sophia tries varied techniques to get the giraffe she wants more than anything in this playfully illustrated story about the nuances of negotiation. 

Sophia has one true desire for her birthday. But she has Four Big Problems in the way: Mom, Dad, Uncle Conrad...and Grand-mama. 

Will her presentations, proposals, and pie charts convince them otherwise? Turns out, all it takes is one word.

When this book came in last year, I thought it was new. It isn't,  it came out on 2015.  Once again, proving that I don't know everything, and I don't know every book on our shelves.

Anyway, I loved the cover, and that's what drew me to read it...a girl in a tutu standing on a giraffe's head.  It becomes clear in the first two pages why there's a giraffe on the cover.  You see, Sophia has One True Desire, and that is to get a pet giraffe for her birthday.

In order to achieve this one true desire, Sophia has to convince four people:

Mother, who was a judge,
Father , who was a businessman,
Uncle Conrad, who was a politician, 
and Grand-mama who was very strict.

And so begins Sophia's quest to convince the four.  There are long-winded reasons, diagrams, charts slideshows and graphs, and after each presentation she's given the brush off, being told her presentation was verbose, effusive and loquacious...

I love the language used in this book, so many words that mean 'using too many words'!...and then there's Activist, Quadruped, Respondents, Revise and Warehousing...all of which are explained in the glossary at the back of the book.  

All of this rich language wrapped up in a book that will appeal to every child who has wished for something big....and the power of one little word...