Despite aesthetic faults, a cute story that expresses an important life lesson—treat others the way you want to be...
A scorned, humble Baltimore City pigeon works hard to feed his family.
Ray toils long hours hunting the streets for treasures to appease his boss, Jim, so he can provide breadcrumbs for his loving wife and daughter. It’s a dangerous life—kicks from unkind humans aren’t uncommon. Ray envies his neighbor, a carrier pigeon, who lives in a wooden house and eats lavishly. But Ray can’t hide who he is: not an angelic white dove, but a working-class rat with wings. In a moment’s notice he can fly away, though, escape his rotten life and forget all his worries. Fortunately, kids won’t get the wrong message from this book, Hobson’s first. Our hero, a family bird, knows the right thing to do in the end. The narrator urges readers to remember Ray’s story before they disparage another pigeon. The protagonist, part of a breed that’s rarely romanticized, is an unusual but apt choice for an emblem. It’s a sweet moral; one that can be extended to all beings. And it’s not the only lesson. “Why can’t people see past the dull colors of black and grey?” laments Ray, suggesting a racial undertone to the plot. The author writes in verse, and some rhymes detract from the overall story. A few of them are just plain contrived: The “carrier pigeon Rob” eats “corn on the cob.” In other instances, illogical words and phrases seem placed in sentences for the sole purpose of maintaining meter. Hobson’s painted cover illustrations are beautiful, but the gray-hued pictures within the book disappear against a poorly contrasting brown background.
Despite aesthetic faults, a cute story that expresses an important life lesson—treat others the way you want to be treated—from a unique point of view.Pub Date: June 12, 2012
ISBN: 978-1468123388
Page Count: 26
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Sept. 17, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
This outing lacks the sophistication of such category standards as Clementine; here’s hoping English amps things up for...
A gentle voice and familiar pitfalls characterize this tale of a boy navigating the risky road to responsibility.
Gavin is new to his neighborhood and Carver Elementary. He likes his new friend, Richard, and has a typically contentious relationship with his older sister, Danielle. When Gavin’s desire to impress Richard sets off a disastrous chain of events, the boy struggles to evade responsibility for his actions. “After all, it isn’t his fault that Danielle’s snow globe got broken. Sure, he shouldn’t have been in her room—but then, she shouldn’t be keeping candy in her room to tempt him. Anybody would be tempted. Anybody!” opines Gavin once he learns the punishment for his crime. While Gavin has a charming Everyboy quality, and his aversion to Aunt Myrtle’s yapping little dog rings true, little about Gavin distinguishes him from other trouble-prone protagonists. He is, regrettably, forgettable. Coretta Scott King Honor winner English (Francie, 1999) is a teacher whose storytelling usually benefits from her day job. Unfortunately, the pizzazz of classroom chaos is largely absent from this series opener.
This outing lacks the sophistication of such category standards as Clementine; here’s hoping English amps things up for subsequent volumes. (Fiction. 6-9)Pub Date: Dec. 17, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-547-97044-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
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