Guatemalan-born author and translator Elisa Amado (who now lives in Toronto) and acclaimed Mexican illustrator Manuel Monroy join forces to present a sweetly educational picture book about a little boy with a lot of questions. Their previous collaboration, What Are You Doing?, was about reading. Why Are You Doing That? looks at where food comes from and how it is prepared. For many Canadian readers, the book will serve as an introduction to a different culture and its cuisine – the frijoles, tortillas, and elote of Central America.

Chepito lives in a rural community where food is consumed near its source, and friendly neighbours are happy to show him the cow being milked, corn ripening on its stalk, eggs being collected, and tortillas being kneaded. Given some freshly picked bananas, Chepito rushes home to share them – and the news that they grow on a tree – with his sister. For young children whose concept of food is based on what they see wrapped in plastic at the supermarket, this information may come as a surprise. Hopefully it will encourage them to find out what foods can be grown in their own gardens or obtained fresh at the local farmers’ market.

While the book is informative, it also relates a fun story, which follows a curious little boy as he spends the morning visiting neighbours and discovering new things about his surroundings. The earth-toned images, featuring characters with round, smiling faces, harmonize well with the mood of the text. Together, Amado and Monroy present Chepito’s world as a pleasant and purposeful one where children, adults, animals, and crops are bound together in a traditional and appealing way of life.