Three-year-old Gabriel uses specific descriptive details as he implores various family members to pretend to be monsters and chase him. He asks Nonna to be "a monster made of bright-pink jelly, with big round eyes and feet that are smelly," while Mommy monster has "spikes on your back, who eats little boys with your teeth that are black." The accommodating humans (as well as a pet and even a potted plant) are pictured chasing Gabriel as requested, while chanting their own monster-y threat ("Schlop, schlap, schlup! I'll gobble you up!"), to which Gabriel always responds "Hee, hee, hee! But you can't catch me!" Gabriel appears white; his family members are both white and brown-skinned in this romp in which the rhyming text, cheery palette, and smiling monsters keep the imaginative game from ever becoming too scary. Generously sized pages and bold black outlines make it a book ideally suited to a story-hour read aloud. (Ages 2-5)

Come on everybody, Gabriel wants to PLAY! You be a monster, and he'll run away. Gabriel is being chased by terrible monsters with sharp pointy teeth, spikes on their back, and smelly feet! But it's all right, they can't catch him, or can they? Let's play monsters!