20 Bad Books To Give To Young Kids

(Image via Firefly Books)

6. Love You Forever

Love You Forever starts out just fine. The 1986 picture book, by Canadian author Robert Munsch and illustrator Sheila McGraw, seems harmless, after all. It tells the story of a mother and son, and their evolving relationship as both age. The young boy is sweet and occasionally aggravating to his apparently single mother. Despite this, each night, the mother enters his room (crawling across the floor, for some reason), rocks her son, and sings him a lullaby about how she’ll always love him.

Sweet, right? Except his mom keeps doing this through his whole life. Once her son becomes an adult and moves out, she continues to visit him. That’s right. She breaks into his home, sneaks into his bedroom, and rocks a grown man while singing him a lullaby. Later, as she ages and (it’s implied) is approaching his own death, her son goes to her house and rocks her. He then goes home and starts the whole process with his infant daughter.

Now, I don’t necessarily have a problem with parents being affectionate to their children. And my discomfort was softened somewhat when I learned that Munsch wrote the book after he and his wife suffered through two miscarriages.

Still, it’s weird. Sneaking into your child’s room and rocking them, even as they become teenagers and then adults? Driving across town to break into their home to repeat the process? On one level, Love You Forever is sweet and speaks to the kind of enduring love that can exist between parent and child. On another level, it’s downright creepy.