I loved the book, LaLa’s Angry Pizza. The story provides children with alternate methods of dealing with bad days. When your child’s day does not go as well as planned, how do you help them? You could offer your child a snack or try to change the topic so they don’t feel so bad. Perhaps if they tell you how their day went, they might feel a little better. Author Tela Kayne understands that the usual after-school rituals may not work and people may have to resort to other tactics. With play dough, LaLa is able to “illustrate” her feelings. There is a recipe for homemade play dough at the back of the book so young readers can illustrate their feelings, too. This book is interesting and educational.

LaLa’s Angry Pizza is a good book for handling frustrations. Author Tela Kayne provides some suggestions on how to deal with disappointing or difficult days. Illustrator Goran Vitanovic provides stunning artwork to help visualize LaLa’s bad day. The full-page illustrations with vibrant colors help to draw readers in and keep them turning the page. Viewers can see the anger in LaLa’s face. I like how the font changes to demonstrate her mood and emphasize certain words. I think that public libraries, school libraries, and home libraries will benefit from the suggestions offered in this book. This book should provide teachers and parents with other methods of dealing with disappointments or frustrations. What do you do to recover from a day that you’d rather hide from?

LaLa’s Angry Pizza, written by Tela Kayne and illustrated by Goran Vitanovic is a story in the LaLa’s World series. The little girl, LaLa, has had a very bad day where everything went wrong. She is grumpy and angry about everything and nothing her mom does seems to help. A hug doesn’t help and her mom can’t even get LaLa to talk about what has her so upset. The little girl begins playing, working play dough into shapes, pounding and molding the play dough. She begins to feel better as her anger seeps away. She uses the play dough to create a pizza with a very angry face. In this way, she is able to express her frustrations and feel better.

The wisdom in LaLa’s Angry Pizza demonstrates that the author, Tela Kayne, has an excellent understanding of what it is like to be a young, angry child. Instead of telling her daughter not to feel or act angry, her mother is understanding and supportive. When Mom tries hugging her daughter and it doesn’t go well, she doesn’t get angry at LaLa. Kayne is teaching parents how to deal with a child’s emotions. Teaching children to handle their emotions in a healthy and perhaps even creative way is demonstrated well in this book. The illustrations created by Goran Vitanovic are bright and fun and expressive. Children will enjoy and learn from the pictures as much as they will from the words in the story. The angry pizza face will make children laugh and understand emotions a bit better.

LaLa’s Angry Pizza is a cute, colorful children’s book that demonstrates one way a child could handle a bad day. LaLa is a little girl who has had a very, very bad day at school. The pictures, bright and engaging, follow her day at school as things go from bad to worse. LaLa must deal with bullies, accidents and trouble with teachers. She gets madder and madder, and even when she gets home, she can’t calm down. Even hugging her mother doesn’t seem to help, so LaLa needs to find another way to release her emotions. Could play dough and pizza be the answer she’s looking for? With a little encouragement from her mother and a lot of creativity, LaLa turns a bad day into a good day.

Tela Kayne wrote this book based the struggles of her own daughter. Anyone who has kids knows that they don’t always know how to handle the emotions that bubble up inside them. Parents and kids will both relate to the fallout after a bad day at school and to the way LaLa soothes herself. The illustrations, created by Goran Vitanovic, are colorful and cute and do a fine job telling the story without words. Even kids who don’t read yet will be able to look at the pictures and figure out what’s going on by themselves. It’s also a good book for parents and kids to read together, and it’s short enough that it will hold their attention all the way to the end.