luckily for my brother and I, it does not appear our parents lied too much during our childhood. Haha! Half the stuff in this illustrated funny book are filled with little sayings that I had never heard. Such as, " beavers play hockey with a literal biscuit" or "bats are just birds dressed up for Halloween." On the other hand, I often heard that" thunder was just angels bowling. " Also, that if you" cross your eyes they will stay like that."
Somehow I do think certain children would find it funny.

I’ve enjoyed Wagner’s work but visually, this book had flaws. I wasn’t a fan of the font used and the splashes behind the font were unpleasant to look at.

I am a 26 year old who you could say is pretty immature, sarcastic and has a crude sense of humour and even I did not get this book. Not a little, not at all! I could appreciate the illustrations but that is it. I don't understand who the consumer target market is for this book as it is totally inappropriate for children but lacking humour and substance for adults. Thanks to net galley for the ARC in return for an honest review but I personally cannot see many people "getting" the humour of this picture book.

Cute book. I hadn't heard most of these coloquolisms. But the illustrations were funny. Would buy as a joke gift.

[Note:  This book was provided free of charge by Net Gallery/Animal Media Group.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.]

I found this book to be surprisingly touching.  In general, I must say that I am not in favor of lying to children.  It is fairly common, unfortunately, for children to ask a lot of questions, not all of which they genuinely wish to know, but all the same I believe that children should receive honest but age-appropriate answers to the concerns that they have and that their curiosity in the world around them should be gratified and encouraged to the greatest extent possible.  I expected this book to be a lot more cynical and sarcastic than it was, and found the book surprisingly touching.  If I feel that the book is mislabeled as humor [1], at least I feel that this book has something to offer that is genuinely touching and much of the artwork here is gorgeous.  The author has done a really good job of taking ridiculous scenarios and showing how they would work out as drawings, and this is a work that has to be seen to be believed, and perhaps even read to children for them to laugh at.

This book is designed very simply and repeats its pattern consistently.  First there is an obviously untrue statement, followed by a drawing that presents what it would look like if this statement was true.  Some of the statements sound like things people would tell their children, like the fact that monsters under the bed just want to read, or that dinosaurs died because they couldn't swim, or that Abraham Lincoln simulated the Civil War with a VR headset or that George Washington was the first president in space.  Other ones seem far darker, like the screeching of screech owls coming from the babies they steal or the fact that the storks are also involved in the baby trafficking ring.  The lies seem set up to show of the virtuoso drawing skills of the author, to point out that perhaps he has a bit too much of an imagination when it comes to telling his kids untruths, and to demonstrate a concern about subject matter children are interested in.  At the very least, while some of these obvious untruths seem particularly frightening to many small children, they at least seem like the sort of thing that children would enjoy reading.

Overall, I think this book is directed at children to prompt them to ask questions or want to create obviously imaginary stories.  Some of these setups will bring a smile and a laugh to tolerant adults, who will no doubt appreciate the talent of the artist as well as the creativity of his untruths.  Even so, this looks like a book whose main audience is young, with monsters that could have come out of Where The Wild Things Are or The Princess In Black or any other related story like that.  The humor is often of a fairly immature but amusing nature, and one can at least see adults--not least the author--trying to fob off irritating questions with stories like these.  For adults, this book is likely a reminder that fiction can be a good place to start a story when, as in this book, it is framed as imaginary and not factual and where there is no attempt to pass them off as true, but merely use them as the origin source for an amusing or heartwarming tale.  Warning children not to accept donuts from gators can be an introduction into discussing dangerous strangers, while telling children that monsters under the bed want to read can point out that even powerful and frightening beings may have surprising vulnerabilities.  These are all things that could help spur the emotional and moral development of children, which is all the more surprising given the silly tone of much of this book.

[1] See, for example:

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017/12/24/book-review-40-humorous-british-traditions/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016/11/30/book-review-the-humor-of-jesus/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017/12/29/book-review-real-ponies-dont-go-oink/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017/10/26/book-review-spurious-connections/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017/10/26/book-review-101-two-letter-words/

Absolutely opposite of what I expected from this book.

The book is about white(!) lies parents tell to their children. There are also illustrations of each lie and especially I liked few of them.

When it comes to lies mentioned in this book, I have mixed thoughts. I heard some of them. The gum, eye and nose lies are obviously typical lies that are told by parents everywhere in the world. But..! The rest of the book really made me question why such things were uttered by parents. Of course, parents lie to convince their children to give disciple or good habits but there were really creepy ones. 🙅 I couldn't laugh, unfortunately.

This book is a giggle from start to finish. There a numerous lies children have been told accompanied with hilarious illustrations. This book made me laugh out loud many times.

I laughed so hard while reading this. Honestly, it's a really funny book with fun illustrations. I wouldn't necessarily read this to kids (why expose the lies) but it is perfect for adults, whether you have kids or not!

Sorry this book wasn't for me.
I have never heard of any of the "lies" but did enjoy the artwork.
I was given this book by NetGalley and the publisher. This is my voluntary review.

This book was really just ok for me. Because of the awesome illustrations, I gave it a three-star rating. I'm a mom of two boys, and as I read the book, I found myself unfamiliar with most of the sayings. That was a huge letdown for me. I wanted to laugh at loud as I reminisced about tales my parents and grandparents told me, but I never connected with the book. Do we tell our kids fibs? Sure, we do!

This was an interesting take on the lies that parents tell kids. I was once a kid, and I have a lot of siblings but a majority of these lies were really weird, somewhat scary and I had never heard at all. There were a handful that I recognized but most were very left-field for me.


Each lie comes with text and then a drawing of the lie. The drawings were awesome and very fun, but the lies were so strange. Who tells their kids that spiders eat people? Wouldn't that have the opposite effect of what you are trying to do?... maybe I just need a kid to understand a few of these. They might be satirical too and I just missed that - it is possible.

The illustrations gave this book an extra star for me, otherwise I was not too impressed.

Except for a couple of the 'lies', I've never heard of any of them. To be honest, I like feel some would seem too violent to even say to kids. On the other hand, the illustrations were great!

2.5

This is more a quirky book for adults then a kids book! Some of the lies would really scare children, but humor adults. I found the illustrations MUCH more appealing then the actual "lies." Would make a really cute coffee table book for someone who enjoys weird facts and/or illustrations.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2173626567

The premise of this book is really cute and it had such good potential but unfortunately, I didn't enjoy it maybe because I didn't relate to it, I had hopes that it might give me a nostalgic feeling of being a little kid but no it didn't even make me laugh.
But I have to admit the illustrations were really good and might be the only reason for giving it one star. sorry!

Got it from NetGalley for an exchange of an honest review.

Some "nice" lies that parents tell their kids. Some I had heard of before but quite a lot that I hadn't but did have a chuckle to myself as I read them!

This book is funny. It has a lie and then on the next page it has a picture of the lie. The pictures made me laugh so hard.

Brett Wagner has created a book with incredible art work which tells a story in themselves and matches them with sayings our parents warned us with as we were children showing us how dark and wild some of the things we were told really were.

This is a nice book to flick through and laugh at the sayings while admiring the art work, some of which would make a great tattoo! I especially loved the saying about how you should eat your vegetables or they will eat you accompanied with the image of a killer carrot.

Quirky, yes, but not all are funny

Lies We Tell Our Kids by Brett Wagner is a collection of made-up stories that adults tell kids in the hope of scaring the little ones to do what we want them to do. A very short read that can be finished in one sitting. The book brings back childhood memories, of times when we were kids who believed everything adults told us, however fantastical these stories may be.

Only a few of those stories included in the book were familiar to me, and I think the book’s illustrations are more scary than funny, really.

*thank you to NetGalley for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review*

1.5 stars.
I grew up in New Zealand, and then spend my teens in Australia and that might be why I have only ever heard 2 of these lies. Some of them are so unbelievable, I mean, do the rest of these actually get said? Its not really funny but I can tell the author is trying which is why the images are done in that cartoon style. I do like one of them though. "The moon follows your car because it's tied to the door."
But I wouldnt buy or recommend this.