The long-winded title of Tom Angleberger’s book, “Fake Mustache Or How Jodie O’Rodeo and Her Wonder Horse (And Some Nerdy Kid) Saved The U.S. Presidential Election From a Mad Genius Criminal Mastermind” is quite a mouthful! For the sake of time, space and breath, we’ll just call it “Fake Mustache.”
Like its silly sounding title, the book is just as a silly as it should be. As soon as you open the front cover, you’re met with illustrations of nine different fake mustaches, from Walras to Lars the Viking. Pretty silly, but something my grandkids love. I’ve yet to meet a little boy who doesn’t love fake mustaches.
Told from the perspective of Lenny Flem Jr., the self-proclaimed “nerdy guy standing in the background,” Lenny’s best friend Casper Bengue buys a very expensive mustache, the Heidelberg Handlebar Number Seven, for a ridiculous price of $129.99.
The story gets going when a mysterious, mustached man goes on a bank robbing spree and then uses the pilfered cash to go on a well-financed bid for the U.S. presidency, all while female heroine Jodie O’Rodeo tries to save the world.
When a mysterious mustached man goes on a bank robbing spree and then goes on a well-financed bid to become the president, Lenny figures out that his best friend isn’t exactly doing good with this fancy new mustache of his.
With the teen cowgirl queen, Jodie O’Rodeo, Lenny will do his best to stop Casper, otherwise known as Fako Mustacho, from getting into the white house. Lenny figures out that his best friend isn’t exactly doing good with this fancy new mustache of his.
This is a hilarious book. My 10-year-old grandson read it first and begged me to read and write about it on the internet (since he knows I do book reviews) and I was skeptical at first. Usually books like these tend to be pretty cheesy, but there were times that I let out a pretty good chuckle.
This line in particular is my favorite: “Casper’s parents are hippies who don’t believe in buying anything unnecessary, but every once and a while his rich grandmother gives him money and makes him promise to buy something as unnecessary as possible.
That’s why Casper’s family has a doorbell that says welcome in the voices of two hundred different country-and-western stars…” I’m not sure why I found that to be as hilarious as I did, but I laughed out loud at that part.
Angleberger did a fantastic job at keeping the book at a level easy enough for beginning chapter readers but funny enough for older kids to laugh at. If you want to read this cute book for yourself, you can buy a copy here. I wholeheartedly recommend it!