A Stinky History of Toilets and Gut Reaction

I would feel somewhat bad about listing these two books together, since the history of toilets might seem to be less serious than the medical issues addressed in Gut Reaction, but a parent recently thanked me for pairing fiction and nonfiction titles for her son, who had previously refused to read fiction books. 

Meikle, Olivia, Nelson, Katie, and Kasperowicz, Ella (illus.) 

A Stinky History of Toilets 

March 5, 2024 by Neon Squid

Copy provided by the Publisher

Sarah Albee's fantastic 2011 Poop Happened: A History of the World from the Bottom Up includes just about everything this new title does, but with more detail. For readers who are more inclined toward shorter snippets of information as well as colorful, infographic style illustrations, this is just as informative, and a tiny bit sillier. 

If you're familiar with the classic Taro Gomi Everyone Poops from 1981, you will not be surprised that there are lots of pictures of poop, done in a somewhat similar style. That will be a big draw for younger readers, who find much humor in this, but the real value is in the complete history of the development of toilets and attendant sanitary facilities. This goes around the world and talks about the differences in practices, and how sometimes people are at odds over these. 

Everything from the well known practices of the Romans, to the Viking midden at Jorvik, to a brief description of John Snow's work with cholera is presented with statistics, maps, and lots of facts. Sure, there are lots of pictures of people sitting on toilets with their pants around their ankles, but if King Louis of France could entertain people in his throne room like this, there's no reason these circumspect illustrations can't point out how things have changed in the world of lavatories. 

Middle school and elementary school libraries need this as a nonfiction accompaniment to all of Dav Pilkey's Captain Underpants books, along with Yomtov's The Gross, Grimy History of the Toilet, Perdew's How the Toilet Changed History, and Marsico's Stinky Sanitation Inventions, and Gregory's 2006 collection of photographs of Toilets of the World. 

Larson, Kirby and Wyatt, Quinn. Gut Reaction
March 5, 2024 by Scholastic Press
E ARC provided by Edelweiss Plus

Tess and her younger sister Gracie have moved to a new place after her mother gets engaged to Scott. Scott is fine, but Tess is still dealing with her father's sudden death from a heart attack three years ago. He was a baker, and Tess has followed in his footsteps, although since he died when she was in the middle of a children's baking competition, it's sometimes hard. Her stomach has been bothering her, sometimes a lot, and she suspects that all of the stressors are piling up. She tries to watch what she eats and avoid things that trigger her, but doesn't tell her mother about her problems. Things get off to a rocky start at her new school, but she eventually makes friends with Elly, who is into older music by artists like Nina Simone and Jimi Hendrix, and her friend Rajit, by bringing baked goods to school. There's also Emmett, who also lost his father, and Brooklyn, who is trying very hard to get their language arts teacher to update the books that the students have to read. When Tess gets an invitation to another competition, she really wants to go, but knows that her mother is struggling with money, and also that this reminder of her father might be difficult. There's also her worsening health condition. Her mother eventually catches on and notices that Tess has lost weight, but it takes a medical emergency to really finally get answers. Still on the mend, Tess has to practice for the baking competition with the help of her new friends. This is tiring, but she manages to come up with some good ideas. The competition is tough, and it doesn't help that Flora, a winner of a previous competition, is a nasty participant. Still, things go well until the final round. 

Strengths: I am all about weaponizing baked goods, even if I will never have enough patience to measure flour by ounces instead of cups! It was good to see that Tess managed to integrate into her new school, and eventually found some friends, and also to see that her stepfather to be was a good guy who was supportive. These are both important messages for young readers; there are too many books where these occurrences are portrayed in very dire ways. Tess' health problems unfold in a realistic way, with enough drama to appeal to young readers. Author Wyatt's own struggles add a nice level of depth to the experience. It's been almost ten years since the We Need Diverse Books movement; now that we have more variety in the ethnic and cultural connections, the new frontier seems to be health issues and LGBTQIA+ characters. It's nice to see a growing number of books with these concerns, and there's certainly room for more of them. 
Weaknesses: I wish there had been more about Tess and Emmett's interest in each other, especially since Elly also had a crush on him, but we don't hear much about that after the competition begins. While I loved that Tess was involved in the competition, I could have used more information about Crohn's disease and fewer details about the baking competition. 

What I really think: This is a good choice for readers who found Arlow's The Year My Life Went Down the Toilet or Eliopolis' Will on the Inside informative, but has more in common with books involving cooking competitions, like Harper's Lights, Cameras, Cook!, Delaney's Alice Fleck's Recipe for Disaster, LaMotte's Measuring Up, Schroeder's It's Raining Cupcakes, or Negron's The Last Super Chef.