Previously published in England as Manatee Baby (2013), this appealing animal-survival adventure is based on a true episode...
In a remote Amazon village, Manuela and her cousin Libia convince an entire village to cease manatee fishing after the two girls rescue, nurture, and release a manatee calf Manuela accidentally speared while hunting its mother.
Watching a manatee die and holding the injured calf she calls Airuwe in her arms is enough to turn Manuela from aspiring manatee hunter to conservationist, but it takes much longer for her to fulfill the silent promise she made to preserve the baby. Raising an orphaned mammal is difficult enough, but there are also threats from both the human and the natural world: the unsavory Clink-Clink, who wants to sell it, and powerful rainy-season floods. Luckily, the girls have the support of their grandmother, a nurse with veterinary experience, and, after an intensive campaign, the community. The third-person narration distances readers a bit, but it allows Davies to weave in details about Amazonian culture and setting as well as the endangered manatees while maintaining gentle suspense. Libia, limping and stunted from a childhood illness, proves skillful in a canoe, and both girls are imaginative and resourceful. Each short chapter includes a grayscale illustration done with brush and pen. Words potentially unfamiliar to general readers are defined in footnotes.
Previously published in England as Manatee Baby (2013), this appealing animal-survival adventure is based on a true episode described in an afterword. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Jan. 5, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-7636-7830-2
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2015
Hugely entertaining, timely, and triumphant.
Robot Roz undertakes an unusual ocean journey to save her adopted island home in this third series entry.
When a poison tide flowing across the ocean threatens their island, Roz works with the resident creatures to ensure that they will have clean water, but the destruction of vegetation and crowding of habitats jeopardize everyone’s survival. Brown’s tale of environmental depredation and turmoil is by turns poignant, graceful, endearing, and inspiring, with his (mostly) gentle robot protagonist at its heart. Though Roz is different from the creatures she lives with or encounters—including her son, Brightbill the goose, and his new mate, Glimmerwing—she makes connections through her versatile communication abilities and her desire to understand and help others. When Roz accidentally discovers that the replacement body given to her by Dr. Molovo is waterproof, she sets out to seek help and discovers the human-engineered source of the toxic tide. Brown’s rich descriptions of undersea landscapes, entertaining conversations between Roz and wild creatures, and concise yet powerful explanations of the effect of the poison tide on the ecology of the island are superb. Simple, spare illustrations offer just enough glimpses of Roz and her surroundings to spark the imagination. The climactic confrontation pits oceangoing mammals, seabirds, fish, and even zooplankton against hardware and technology in a nicely choreographed battle. But it is Roz’s heroism and peacemaking that save the day.
Hugely entertaining, timely, and triumphant. (author’s note) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9780316669412
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often...
A successful juvenile by the beloved New Yorker writer portrays a farm episode with an imaginative twist that makes a poignant, humorous story of a pig, a spider and a little girl.
Young Fern Arable pleads for the life of runt piglet Wilbur and gets her father to sell him to a neighbor, Mr. Zuckerman. Daily, Fern visits the Zuckermans to sit and muse with Wilbur and with the clever pen spider Charlotte, who befriends him when he is lonely and downcast. At the news of Wilbur's forthcoming slaughter, campaigning Charlotte, to the astonishment of people for miles around, spins words in her web. "Some Pig" comes first. Then "Terrific"—then "Radiant". The last word, when Wilbur is about to win a show prize and Charlotte is about to die from building her egg sac, is "Humble". And as the wonderful Charlotte does die, the sadness is tempered by the promise of more spiders next spring.
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often informative as amusing, and the whole tenor of appealing wit and pathos will make fine entertainment for reading aloud, too.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1952
ISBN: 978-0-06-026385-0
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1952
PERSPECTIVES
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