Peanut Butter and Brains: A Zombie Culinary Tale

Gr 1–3—As zombies ramble through the streets of an unnamed neighborhood searching for the elusive "brains" they crave, Reginald decides to be the rebel of the group and is instead on the lookout for a delicious… peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Reginald searches all day looking for what he wants until he finds it at a busy bus stop in the hands of a young girl. McGee's story has humor throughout (when he asks his lunch lady for a sandwich, she "slap(s) a hunk of meat loaf on his tray instead. It looked an awful lot like brains."). Santoso's watercolor and ink illustrations are a soothing, sometimes dull palette of blues and grays, creating a nice balance between silly and scary but never verging on frightening. Text and illustrations work well together to make an amusing read-aloud for older kids around Halloween time. The mustard yellow endpapers showcase the different cuisine options for the zombies, with speech bubbles filled with brains on the front and PB&J sandwiches in speech bubbles on the back, echoing the zombies' exclamations throughout the story.