Buckle up for this intrepid crawler’s quest—a rhyming ride with a racing twist.
An infant’s crawl across the living room turns into a fantastical, perspective-shifting racing adventure.
A red-helmeted baby races across a living room that’s been recast as an epic racetrack, with furniture and other ordinary objects becoming forests, mountains, and waterways. Encouraged by an older sibling (“Baby, start your engine…crawl!”), the determined infant navigates obstacles, makes pit stops, and presses onward to the finish line. Tobin Fine’s racing terminology (straightaway, stalls) creates an effective sports-announcer rhythm that propels the narrative forward, while the consistent rhyming text keeps the momentum going throughout. Fabiani’s child-friendly mixed-media illustrations skillfully depict the dual perspective—both the actual living room and the way the baby sees it. The compositions play with scale, transforming a parquet floor and fluffy carpeting into vast terrains from Baby’s viewpoint. In one particularly effective spread, Fabiani frames Baby’s vision through a helmet-shaped portal with dashboardlike indicators below, cleverly simulating how the world might appear through a racer’s visor, reinforcing Baby’s imaginative point of view while maintaining the book’s racing theme. Worth noting is the text’s consistent use of they/them pronouns for the baby and nongendered descriptions of family members (“Parked right on their parent’s knee, / Baby’s where they’re meant to be”). Characters are pale-skinned.
Buckle up for this intrepid crawler’s quest—a rhyming ride with a racing twist. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9780593904992
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
These reindeer games are a bit tired but, given the series’ popularity, should have a large, ready-made audience.
The How to Catch A… crew try for Comet.
Having already failed to nab a Halloween witch, the Easter Bunny, a turkey, a leprechaun, the Tooth Fairy, and over a dozen other iconic trophies in previous episodes of this bestselling series, one would think the racially diverse gaggle of children in Elkerton’s moonlit, wintry scenes would be flagging…but no, here they lay out snares ranging from a loop of garland to an igloo baited with reindeer moss to an enticing candy cane maze, all in hopes of snagging one of Santa’s reindeer while he’s busy delivering presents. Infused with pop culture–based Christmas cheer (“Now I’ve already seen the shelf with the elf”), Comet prances past the traps until it’s time to gather up the kids, most of whom look terrified, for a group snapshot with the other reindeer and then climb back into harness: “This was a great stop but a few million to go / Christmas Eve must continue with style!” Though festive, the verse feels trite and unlikely to entice youngsters. A sprinkling of “True Facts About Reindeer” (“They live in the tundra, where they have friends like the arctic bunny”) wrap up this celebration of the predatory spirit. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
These reindeer games are a bit tired but, given the series’ popularity, should have a large, ready-made audience. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2022
ISBN: 9781728276137
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Dec. 12, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A handsome edition of an old favorite.
The familiar cumulative game is played by four children, along with their father and their dog, at the typically British beach pictured on the lovely, expansive first endpaper.
The children's real activities are shown in b&w drawings; the imaginative doings appear in full color. Although some of the color pages show perfectly possible events, most are clearly fantasy, suggesting just how close the two may be in children's minds. The family ends up in safe retreat in one big cozy bed; the bear is seen--on the second essential, beautiful endpaper--headed into a gloomy sea. Oxenbury's splendid watercolors and drawings perfectly evoke both landscape and the members of the questing family.
A handsome edition of an old favorite. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: Sept. 30, 1989
ISBN: 978-0-689-50476-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: McElderry
Review Posted Online: June 16, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1989
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