I’m Almost Perfect. Really. Truly.

Stumpkin
Written & Illustrated by Lucy Ruth Cummins
Age Level: 2-7 Years
Published July 24, 2018

I drink from stemless wine glasses just fine.

One of the more bucolic memories I have from my childhood in Ohio is picking pumpkins. We would go to a large dairy farm that had the most beautiful creamy white barn, and every October there would be piles upon heaps of pumpkins stacked right outside. I always wanted the biggest, fattest orange pumpkin I could find, whereas my mother baffled me as she filled our wheelbarrow with lumpy, stripy gourds that she would later artfully arrange into a centerpiece for the kitchen table.

Much like the pumpkins of my childhood dreams, the display outside of a city corner store is stocked with rows of plump orange pumpkins. All of them are eager to be chosen by passersby so they can perch proudly on windowsills and achieve jack o’lantern status. But one pumpkin is nervous about his chances of finding a home. Even though he is perfect in regard to size, color, and shape, he has nothing but a stump where his stem should be. He’s a stemless pumpkin. A stumpkin.

“He was very nearly the perfect pumpkin.
Very nearly. Truly!”

I love this book because it is laugh-out-loud funny in several places. Older children (4+) will get the jokes and be giggling right along with you. And younger ones will be so invested in finding out what happens to poor Stumpkin that they won’t mind missing the punch lines. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a bowl of gourds to arrange.

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