Dad Needs a NEW BUM!  
Dawn McMillan Ill. Ross Kinnaird

                                                                                                 

Dad Needs a NEW BUM! 
Dawn McMillan
Ill. Ross Kinnaird
Oratia Books (2026)
Picture book
32 pages, Paperback
ISBN 978 1 991353 04 7

 

‘Poor Dad’s face is red. He’s shaking his head.
And I know I have to help.’

 

This picture book is a sequel to such familiar volumes as I Need a New Bum! (2012), I’ve Broken My Bum! (2019), My Bum is So Noisy! (2021), My Bum is So Cheeky! (2022), My Bum is So Chrismassy! (2022), My Bum is So Spooky (2023), My Bum’s on the Run! (2023), My Dad’s Runaway Bum! (2024) and Santa Needs a new Bum! (2025). In other words, welcome to the world’s longest-running fart joke.

 

Dawn McMillan writes witty verses, and Ross Kinnaird creates witty illustrations. They have worked hard to achieve their international success. Amazingly, they have also managed to deliver an amusing surprise ending to this thirteenth volume.  Pun-lovers will have spotted that is published just  in time for Farters’ Day. [Meanwhile a Texas court has ruled that librarians have to reinstate the McMillan-Kinnaird titles, previously removed after objections to the term New Butt used in the USA versions. No problems in Australia or the UK with the New Bum titles.]

 

Dad needs a New Bum! begins with the usual suspects. For once, the ‘boy in red pants’ is not in trouble. Instead, he is virtuously pointing the finger at his Dad, while Sister sulks, Mum frowns, Grandpa holds his nose and the dog rolls his eyes. Seated in his armchair, Dad is surrounded by noxious fumes (depicted as an acid-green fog).

‘And everybody says, “Oooh, Dad, that has to be you!”
But Dad says, “No! Not me! Not True!’

 

Bright colours and simple shapes are Ross Kinnaird’s pictorial hallmark and his illustrations are a riot of movement and colour, perfectly matched to Dawn McMillan’s verse storytelling. I have often mentioned the way the boy’s dog manages to pop up in every picture but in this story the nasty green miasma also appears in every picture. 

 

Does Dad really need a new bum? The mystery smell problem only worsens as members of the extended family arrive. Grandma tries bringing roses, without success. Aunty and the ‘boy in red pants’ go for a (very funny) hi-tech solution which fails to solve anything. Perfumes and diets don’t help. Then, just as the cousins arrive, the ‘boy in red pants’ spots something which the reader should have noticed right from the first picture. The cause of the pong is identified and a much-higher-tech solution to the smelly problem is produced.

‘And poor Dad’s had the blame!’

 

The cheerful conclusion sees order restored, Dad vindicated and the home environment protected. A perfect ending for the series, perhaps? Not at all. A new volume can be looked for in 2027

 

Trevor Agnew

25 July 2026  [Review 3855.]

 

 

My Dad’s Runaway Bum!  Dawn McMillan Ross Kinnaird  

 

My Dad’s Runaway Bum! 
Dawn McMillan, ill. Ross Kinnaird
Oratia Books (2024)
Picture book, Paperback, 32 pages
ISBN 978 1 99 004254 6

 

‘An explosion! A blast! Something’s happening and it’s happening fast!’

This picture book is a sequel to I Need a New Bum! (2012), I’ve Broken My Bum! (2019), My Bum is So Noisy! (2021), My Bum is So Cheeky! (2022), My Bum is So Chrismassy! (2022), My Bum is So Spooky (2023) and My Bum’s on the Run! (2023).

By now the pattern is well established.

Our hero, the ‘boy in red pants,’ is disturbed to find that his father’s consumption of such dangerous foodstuff as cabbage and peas has caused a disaster. ‘Dad’s bum has blown off!’ Not only that, it has also run away. In bouncy rhymes, the errant buttocks escape down the street, with father and son in pursuit.

‘Past joggers in tights. Past bikers with lights.’

Several minor catastrophes and a major police pursuit later, there is a surprise solution to the problem. A difficult day ends with a son’s final warning to his father, one which may well be echoed by some readers.

Ross Kinnaird’s lively illustrations are brilliantly colourful and surprisingly tactful. The rogue bum remains discreetly clad in yellow boxer shorts throughout its independent existence. The family dog, familiar from previous adventures, has managed to insert himself into almost every picture, including a spell as a K9 officer in the police patrol.

 

Trevor Agnew 

 25 January 2024  [Review 3612]

I Need a New Bum! Activity Book  
Betsy Ochester, Dawn McMillan, Ross Kinnaird

 

I Need a New Bum! Activity Book   

Betsy Ochester and Dawn McMillan
Illustrator: Ross Kinnaird
Oratia Books (2024)
Activity book, Paperback, 48 pages
ISBN: 978 1 99 004246  

 

‘I woke up this morning

looking for puzzles to do.

I craved mazes and codes,

and word searches, too.’

This puzzle book is a companion volume to the Dawn McMillan’s picture book series about the boy who needed a new bum. This un-named lad (with his dog) acts as a guide through a range of brain-teasers, word games, art challenges, crosswords, code-crackers and mazes, all with buttocks-related themes. And flatulence-related themes too of course. There are puns and frog jokes and even designs for door-hanger signs.

As always, the boy’s dog, known as Dog, is in attendance throughout.

 

Trevor Agnew 

21 October 2024  [Review 3722]

 

 

Woolly Wally, Dawn McMillan, Ross Kinnaird, 2006

Papa’s Island, Melanie Drewery, ill Fifi Colston, Reed, Auckland, New Zealand, 2006, 24 pages, paperback, NZ $16.99 ISBN 1-86948-594-7

A Present from the Past, Jennifer Beck, ill Lindy Fisher, Scholastic, Auckland, New Zealand, 2006, 31 pages, paperback, NZ$16.99 ISBN 1-86943-744-6

Woolly Wally, Dawn McMillan, ill. Ross Kinnaird, Reed, Auckland, New Zealand, 2006, 24 pages, paperback, NZ$14.99 ISBN 1-86948-442-8

Clever Moo, Melinda Szymanik, ill. Malcolm Evans, Scholastic, Auckland, New Zealand, 2006, 24 pages, paperback, NZ$16.99 ISBN 1-86943-710-1

These four colourful New Zealand picture books fall neatly into two categories: two help young readers to experience some of the emotional impact of past wars, while the other two have some light-hearted fun with our most important animals.

Melanie Drewery’s Papa’s Island is an interesting picture book about a small girl’s messages to her father, an Italian interned on Somes Island as an “enemy alien” during World War 2. “We went to the beach and waved. We could see the island but we could not see him.” They send letters instead. Fifi Colston’s pictures have some historical inaccuracies but they capture the girl’s emotions as she misses her papa, as well as her joy when they are reunited. This book gives young readers an insight into an unusual aspect of wartime New Zealand.

The setting for Jennifer Beck’s A Present From the Past is modern Auckland, where young Emily receives an unusual Christmas gift that draws her into the experiences of her great-grandparents in World War One. At first Emily is doubtful. ‘Surely this battered old box wasn’t the ‘something special’ Aunt Mary had travelled from the other side of the world to deliver?’ The gift is one of the brass boxes of sweets, cigarettes and chocolate that Princess Mary had sent to servicemen and nurses at Christmas 1914. Aunt Mary explains to Emily how this particular box saved a nurse’s life and led to a marriage. Lindy Fisher’s illustrations are artistically splendid and use a wide range of symbols, although sometimes at the expense of the text’s legibility.

It’s hard to know which creature should represent our nation. One light-hearted candidate is Woolly Wally, a merino ram, immensely pleased with his fine fleece, and flock of ewes. “I walk the talk. See me strut!I am so tough! Watch me butt!” he boasts, in rhyming couplets. Wally’s pride takes a fall when the shearers arrive and he is soon “bare and bedraggled, skinny and thin”. Fortunately for Wally, he finds that we are not judged by appearances. Ross Kinnaird’s boldly sketched cartoons capture the spirit of Dawn McMillan’s sheep, even if it’s a little odd to see machine-shearing for merinos.

If not a sheep, then perhaps a cow? Margaret stands out among the other cows in Melinda Szymanik’s Clever Moo for several reasons. She wears spectacles and pearls, sings, reads books and has an alarming allergy. “It’s hay fever,” the doctor said, “You’re allergic to grass.” Malcolm Evans’ droll cartoons show Margaret’s quest for an alternative career. After failing as a model and TV News presenter, Margaret finds a remarkable and highly appropriate job that should make this funny book a popular item in every library.

In fact all four should be in every library. And home.

Trevor Agnew

First published in The Press, Christchurch, New Zealand, on April 29th 2006.

The Really Sticky Grubby Lolly, Yvonne Marie Dudman, Ross Kinnaird, 2005

Five New Zealand Picture Books for Young Readers

THE REALLY STICKY GRUBBY LOLLY, Yvonne Marie Dudman, ill. Ross Kinnaird, Reed, Auckland, New Zealand, 2005, 25 pages, paperback, NZ$14.99 ISBN 1-86948-580-7

PANKI IN THE LAND OF THE KIWI, Amy Lam, Reed, Auckland, New Zealand, 2005, 24 pages, paperback, NZ$14.99 ISBN 1-86948-585-8

SCRUFFTY MOUSE AND ONE-EYED TED, Penney Wech, ill. Philip Webb, Reed, Auckland, New Zealand, 2005 , 28 pp, Pb, NZ$14.99 ISBN 1-86948-581-5

BABY COW POWER, Kim Riley, ill. Deb Hinde, Random House, Auckland, New Zealand, 2005, 24pp, paperback, NZ$19.95 ISBN 1-86941-723-2

WHERE’S THE GOLD? Pamela Allen, Penguin/Viking, Auckland, New Zealand, 2005, 30pp, hardback, NZ$25 ISBN 0-670-02844-4

Picture books are presents that last a lifetime, and parents have a wide range to choose from. Here are five good New Zealand titles:

Amy Lam is a New Zealand artist who uses her Chinese heritage to create a magnificent parable, Panki in the Land of the Kiwi, about a panda who emigrates. Inspired by reading about Kiwiland, Panki the panda leaves his crowded city (where all the houses are panda-shaped) and arrives in Kiwiland wearing a marvellous home-made kiwi suit as a symbol of his willingness to fit in. At first Panki has difficulty meeting a kiwi, because of a small failure in his research. When does a kiwi sleep? Then a voice in the darkness says, “Kia ora”, and Panki finds the acceptance he seeks.
Lam’s pictures are as charming as her story.

Baby Cow Power is Kim Riley’s sequel to her Cow Power (2004) about Cow 569, which famously helped tow her from the Manawatu floods. Now Cow 569 has given birth to a bull calf and Baby Cow Power tells how this calf’s special status brings it an unusual name – Tuggy’s Buoy – strong public interest and a remarkable destination. Deb Hinde’s illustrations create a cheerfully unromanticised farm setting, with electric fences, muddy ditches, ear tags and a wind-farm on the skyline. Those who look carefully at the pictures will see what the cattle are saying.

The Really Sticky Grubby Lolly is Yvonne Marie Dudman’s story of a little girl’s busy week. On Monday she gets the lolly for being good but then things go amusingly wrong. For readers, the delight comes from comparing the girl’s version of events with Ross Kinnaird’s colourful cartoon-style illustrations. “On Thursday I put Mum’s car keys in a really special place so my brother wouldn’t break them,” becomes much more interesting when we see the keys being popped into a drain! And the lolly? Let’s just say it turns out to be an all-week sucker.

In Scruffty Mouse and One-eyed Ted, Penney Wech follows the fate of worn-out toys. In the 50 cent toy bin at the Op-Shop are a battered teddy bear and a damaged mouse. Both have been deeply loved ‘but not any more’. Then Michael arrives on his first shopping trip with a dollar to spend. What follows is heart-warming and funny, as Michael’s mother helps him to refurbish Scruffty Mouse, and provide a new eye for Ted. The lovely illustrations by Philip Webb – an unsung hero of the children’s book world – reinforce the message about the joy of a comforting cuddle with a beloved old toy.

The best of this handsome bunch is Where’s the Gold? Pamela Allen uses vivid verse and happy repetitions to tell the story of three young, gold-seeking pirates. ‘and there they found a big deep hole in the ground.’ Allen’s delightful pictures show the three tip-toeing nervously down a dark tunnel, through streams and over the boulders: ‘clawing and clutching, they clambered.’ The alliteration, parrot noises and repetition make this a delightful book to read aloud and share with young readers, especially when the panicked pirates make a hasty retreat. Several more surprises are included in this book’s construction, ensuring that the plucky trio do, indeed, discover gold.

Trevor Agnew

First published in The Press, Christchurch, New Zealand, on January 7th 2006.