A gentle celebration of family and togetherness across time.
In Copeland’s debut picture book, a young girl is cheered by thoughts of untold generations of her family who have loved their children.
Bella, who has light brown skin and reddish-brown hair, is sad because she hasn’t been invited to her friend Maggie’s party. Bella worries that she and Maggie are no longer “special together,” meaning that Bella herself might not be special. Her Mommy reminds her how much she and Bella’s Daddy love her, and how much Bella’s grandparents love her—even Grandma Louise, who died before Bella was born. This leads to talk of Bella’s eight great-grandparents, and 16 great-great-grandparents, and so on, escalating to a host of loving ancestors from all over the world. Bella is reassured: “That’s a lot of my people who love me, and a lot of people for me to love back.” Copeland effectively narrates the story primarily through naturalistic conversation, using blue text for Bella and green for Mommy. Rather than shying away from talk of difficult topics like death and dementia, this catalogue of loved ones actively embraces those who have died. This commemoration of lineage serves not only to soothe Bella’s doubts but also to recognize racial diversity, as the parenting lines stretch back to encompass what appears to be a multitude of histories and cultures. Lettis brings an upbeat, colorful illustration style that focusses on character and beautifully captures the many different physiognomies united here in familial love.
A gentle celebration of family and togetherness across time.Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2024
ISBN: 9798990827318
Page Count: 32
Publisher: BookBaby
Review Posted Online: Sept. 11, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
It doesn’t take a fortune teller to predict the laughter that will emanate from this world of tomorrow.
The future is now…and it’s exceedingly silly.
“This book is from the future.” What are things like there? Barnett enlightens readers: “The sun is called the moon and the moon is called the sun.” Readers learn that apples no longer exist (Barnett doesn’t explain why), that lots of people are named “Charlie Cheese Face” (“There’s an interesting reason why, but we don’t have time for that story”), and that instead of “goodbye,” people now say, “You smell like a baby!” The work closes with a ridiculous conversation between two characters who somehow manage to work in most of the new terms. This tale’s raison d’être seems to be coming up with the goofiest alternatives to normal day-to-day terms and interactions. Barnett gets seriously silly as he thinks up gags ideal for reading aloud at storytime. As for Harris’ art, aside from the occasional cool pair of sunglasses or hair dye, the future feels pretty early-21st-century; his colorful ink and gouache illustrations are rife with visual gags. Futuristic terms look as if they were printed on a label maker. Human characters vary in skin tone.
It doesn’t take a fortune teller to predict the laughter that will emanate from this world of tomorrow. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9798217033171
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Nov. 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
