Anticipating the visit of a favorite person is half the fun. Planning all the things he likes to do, the narrator of this celebration of childhood, includes telling knock-knock jokes, visiting a construction site, picking up lucky pennies, drinking hot chocolate, cooking, eating and cleaning up together, and just having a good time. What the narrator doesn’t like is putting on scratchy dress-up clothes, eating “funny-looking food,” or watching movies that are too “kissy.” Shields (Martian Rock, 1999, etc.) tells the story from the narrator’s point of view and then delivers a punchy surprise ending for this absolutely charming tale of grandfather and grandson. Nakata’s gentle watercolors for her first picture-book illustrations are alive with color, movement, and humor. They support and extend the text with funny little bits that provoke a grin and a chuckle. The love this grandfather and grandchild have for each other fills every page. A good read-aloud selection for the younger crowd and a nice addition to grandparents’ collections of books to share. (Picture book. 3-7)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-525-46450-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Picture-book debuts for both author and illustrator result in an affectionate glimpse of intergenerational bonds. Juno loves to get letters in the red-and-blue bordered airmail envelopes that come from his grandmother, who lives in Korea, near Seoul. He cannot read Korean, but he opens the letter anyway, and learns what he can from what his grandmother has sent: a photograph of herself and her new cat, and a dried flower from her garden. When his parents read him the letter, he realizes how much he learned from the other things his grandmother mailed to him. He creates some drawings of himself, his parents, house, and dog, and sends them along with a big leaf from his swinging tree. He gets back a package that includes drawing pencils and a small airplane—the grandmother is coming to visit. The messages that can be conveyed without words, language differences between generations, and family ties across great distances are gently and affectingly handled in this first picture book. The illustrations, done in oil-paint glazes, are beautifully lit; the characters, particularly Grandmother, with her bowl of persimmons, her leafy garden, and her grey bun that looks “like a powdered doughnut,” are charming. (Picture book. 3-7)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-670-88252-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
One of a four-book series designed to help the very young prepare for new siblings, this title presents a toddler-and-mother pair (the latter heavily pregnant) as they read about new babies, sort hand-me-downs, buy new toys, visit the obstetrician and the sonographer, speculate and wait. Throughout, the child asks questions and makes exclamations with complete enthusiasm: “How big is the baby? What does it eat? I felt it move! Is it a boy or girl?” Fuller’s jolly pictures present a biracial family that thoroughly enjoys every moment together. It’s a bit oversimplified, but no one can complain about the positive message it conveys, appropriately, to its baby and toddler audience. The other titles in the New Baby series are My New Baby (ISBN: 978-1-84643-276-7), Look at Me! (ISBN: 978-1-84643-278-1) and You and Me (ISBN: 978-1-84643-277-4). (Board book. 18 mos.-3)
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-84643-275-0
Page Count: 12
Publisher: Child's Play
Review Posted Online: June 3, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
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