This heartfelt, humane vignette provides just the right details to appeal to animal-loving children.
An elephant’s lifelong journey from the island of Sumatra to an American traveling circus, a zoo and finally a sanctuary is recounted in this graceful and poignant story.
Anju’s early idyll in her natural habitat is abruptly halted when, at the age of five, she is taken from her family and forced into the demanding life of a circus elephant, then placed within the confinement of a zoo. Now, 50 years later, Anju is being led and coaxed on another journey, one that her mahout Vincent promises will help her retire with dignity and safety. Butler’s realistic paintings in acrylic and colored pencil deliver a soft, hazy muted quality that provides balance to the gentle and often lyrical narration, which highlights Anju’s flashback memories of her childhood life with fellow young elephant Lali. “The rhythmic, lapping waters of the surrounding Indian Ocean and South China Sea were their island lullaby. Closing their long-lashed eyelids and lying together with their families, Anju and Lali slept in the tall, ticklish grasses, heartbeat-to-heartbeat.” Anju enters her new home with trepidation yet is welcomed by a kind mahout and new elephant companion who greet her with encouraging tenderness. An elephant Q&A and information on helping elephants provides background and a means to action for engaged readers.
This heartfelt, humane vignette provides just the right details to appeal to animal-loving children. (Picture book. 5-9)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-58536-533-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Having put together a band with renowned cousin Duck Ellington and singer “Bee” Holiday, Rooster’s chances sure look...
Winning actually isn’t everything, as jazz-happy Rooster learns when he goes up against the legendary likes of Mules Davis and Ella Finchgerald at the barnyard talent show.
Having put together a band with renowned cousin Duck Ellington and singer “Bee” Holiday, Rooster’s chances sure look good—particularly after his “ ‘Hen from Ipanema’ [makes] / the barnyard chickies swoon.”—but in the end the competition is just too stiff. No matter: A compliment from cool Mules and the conviction that he still has the world’s best band soon puts the strut back in his stride. Alexander’s versifying isn’t always in tune (“So, he went to see his cousin, / a pianist of great fame…”), and despite his moniker Rooster plays an electric bass in Bower’s canted country scenes. Children are unlikely to get most of the jokes liberally sprinkled through the text, of course, so the adults sharing it with them should be ready to consult the backmatter, which consists of closing notes on jazz’s instruments, history and best-known musicians.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-58536-688-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2011
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