Book Review: I Said No!: A Kid-To-Kid Guide To Keeping Private Parts Private

Title: I Said No!: A kid-to-kid guide to keeping private parts private
Author: Zack and Kimberly King
Illustrator: Sue Rama
ISBN-13: 978-1-878076-49-6
Suggested Retail Price: $12.95
For Ages: 5-11
38 pages, Softcover

I had actually wondered lately on how to address “red flag” areas/private parts with my daughters, especially my oldest, with now having more social interaction with her peers and just being more inquisitive about how things are different and details on how and why they work.

Here is a summary of I Said No!:

Helping kids set healthy boundaries for their private parts can be a daunting and awkward task for parents, counselors and educators. Written from a kid’s point of view, I Said No! makes this task a lot easier.

To help Zack cope with a real-life experience he had with a “friend”, he and his mom wrote a book to help prepare other kids to deal with a range of problematic situations. I Said No! uses kid-friendly language and illustrations to help parents and concerned adults give kids guidance they can understand, practice and use.

Using a simple, direct, decidedly “non-icky” approach that doesn’t dumb down the issues involved, as well as an easy-to-use system to help kids rehearse and remember appropriate responses to help keep them safe, I Said No! covers a variety of topics, including:

What’s appropriate and with whom.

How to deal with inappropriate behavior, bribes and threats.

When and where to go for help, and what to do if the people you’re turning to for help don’t listen.

Dealing with feelings of guilt and shame.

About the Authors and Illustrator:

Kimberly King, Zack’s mom, is a Navy wife and kindergarten teacher with a Master’s degree in Early Child Education from Wheelock College in Boston.

Zachary King, Lives with his mom, dad, older sister and dog Max in Hawaii. Zack is a surfer and he hopes that, just like a good surfboard, this book will carry kids safely through any difficult seas.

Sue Rama is both a writer and illustrator for numerous children’s books. She is the 2005 recipient of the Tomie dePaola Award awarded at the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators Winter Conference. Sue lives in East Windsor Hill, Connecticut.

Boulden Publishing was kind to share some images from I Said No!

Review: I feel I Said No! presents an important topic for parents to discuss with their children before they are fed the wrong information or are led into a DANGER, RED FLAG! situation and could become physically or emotionally hurt in some way. My daughters would chime in with DANGER, RED FLAG! part way through the book at scenarios that were unsafe. This book is written in a language that I feel is easy for children to understand at the 5-11-year-old range. My five-year-old had a grasp of the scenarios. I think my three-year-old was entertained by the drawings and liked chiming in with her sister, which I am fine with. Down the road, she will obtain a better understanding when I read this book to her again.

The only thing I wish was laid out a little differently in the book is some of the important discussion topics brought up for a parent to discuss with their child. They are written in with the story so I got caught reading them out loud to my children, like “Maybe you would like to talk about a safety plan now.” This is when the book talks about inappropriate behavior from a babysitter, telling how a child should react, and telling parents about the incident right away when they get home. I would like to see a statement, like the one above, being noted in a box or with an asterisk, as a special note. It may make it a little easier to follow. I felt a little silly reading it aloud and then needing to go back and explain what I meant instead of using the topic for discussion and bringing it up in my own way to my kids. Very good points, just maybe a slightly different layout.

Kudos to Zack King for telling his mom about the personal incident which stemmed the need to write I Said No! and his mom, Kimberly, for helping prepare our young children for scenarios we as parents may have otherwise overlooked.

I Said No!: A Kid-To-Kid Guide To Keeping Private Parts Private may be purchased through, Amazon, Boulden Publishing, and Baker and Taylor.

Disclosure: I received a copy of this book to produce this review. The thoughts and feelings expressed are my own. No other compensation was received to produce this post.

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