Go the F**k to Sleep, and other sweet nothings to tell your child.

So. I know what you've been thinking since November 1st: It's freaking National Picture Book Idea Month and I have been so negligent in my picture book reading. Don't lie. You had all the makings of an elaborate plan to increase your intake of pretty illustrations and rhyming couplets, but each day, after looking at the annotated calendar of goals and accomplishments that have gone unfinished, you feel like a failure.

NOT TO WORRY ANYMORE!

From the dark mind of newly sleepless father, Adam Mansbach, comes "Go the F**k to Sleep." ...And you thought picture books were simply for the swinging underarm fat of elementary school librarians.

For full disclosure, I have no children, I'm not expecting, I have no friends who are expecting (yet), but, I absolutely loved this book. Maybe it's the fact that I likely said these words when my baby sister, thirteen years my younger came into this planet. Maybe it's the near canonical appreciation my mother has for "Goodnight Moon," which this book clearly plays off of. Most likely, it's my fantasizing that if, (God forbid), I ever have a child, I would actually use this book to lull him/her/it to sleep.

I don't think I actually need to explain the premise here, but, suffice it to say, the book's language would immediately garner an "R" rating while it sweetly, subtly demeans a restless child as she refuses to sleep. Oh, and the audio book is narrated by Samuel L. Jackson. Literary? No. Perfect? Yes.

I got to meet Mansbach tonight at a reading where, among other tidbits of wisdom, he professed his displeasure with the lack of humor in Sweden, had the opportunity to emphatically announce his level of higher education, and took jabs at two of my favorite women in the world: Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb. Overall: quality human being.

But seriously check out this book. It makes for a perfect gift for any mother or father to be. I'll even plug it. Go to Akashic Books, the indie publisher that got it started.