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MIRI'S MOVING DAY

Name: MIRI'S MOVING DAY
Author: Adam R. Chang
ISBN: 9798765603017

by Adam R. Chang & Stephanie Wildman ; illustrated by Dream Chen ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 5, 2024

A sweet story of a family blending traditions.

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Moving stirs up big emotions for a young Jewish Chinese child.

Miri blinks back tears; the little one will miss Mah Mah and Yeh Yeh (Cantonese for paternal grandmother and Mandarin/Cantonese for paternal grandfather, respectively), who look after Miri while Mom and Dad are at work. Miri will also miss the stone Chinese lions outside the family’s apartment. But as everyone packs up the furniture, Yeh Yeh and Miri’s other grandfather, Zayde (Yiddish for grandfather), take Miri out for ice cream. Yeh Yeh gives Miri a beautiful mezuzah case and explains, “There are no stone lions to guard your new apartment building, but you can hang this mezuzah at your door.” Zayde supplies the scroll to place inside, and they all head to Miri’s new apartment. The whole family gathers as Zayde says the special blessing; then they hang the mezuzah above the front door. Later, Zayde has another surprise for Miri: a pair of small carved red lions. Miri is adorable, but other characters are less consistent in their depiction from page to page, and details in the text aren’t always fleshed out (Mah Mah and Yeh Yeh were Miri’s caregivers before, so what will happen in their new home?). Nonetheless, the family’s love is palpable, and readers will appreciate how all four grandparents work to honor Miri’s heritage—Yeh Yeh mentions learning about mezuzahs from Zayde, while Bubbe (Miri’s maternal grandmother) and Mah Mah both prepare Shabbat dinner.

A sweet story of a family blending traditions. (authors’ note, glossary) (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2024

ISBN: 9798765603017

Page Count: 24

Publisher: Kar-Ben

Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2024

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2024

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S RELIGIOUS FICTION

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SPAGHETTI HEAD & CHICKEN FINGERS

by Rhett McLaughlin & Link Neal ; illustrated by Erica Salcedo ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 16, 2026

Wild and wacky.

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A picture book from the comedy duo known as Rhett & Link, creators of the online juggernaut Good Mythical Morning.

Lumo is obsessed with chicken fingers; Saffy, who is new to town and anxious about starting school, finds comfort in the only food she likes: buttered spaghetti. The night before the first day of school, a thunderstorm rages, and each kid makes a wish—“to have chicken fingers at school,” in Lumo’s case; Saffy wishes for “the first thing off the top of her head: buttered spaghetti.” File under “Be careful what you wish for.” Lumo’s and Saffy’s respective physical changes (chicken fingers for fingers, spaghetti for hair) make navigating school a challenge but bring them together in the cafeteria, where they enjoy some new foods—and their new friendship. The plotting could have been sharper: Why do the kids’ bodies suddenly return to normal? And couldn’t the authors have thought up a less old-hat story-ending punch line? Nevertheless, McLaughlin and Neal get by on their charm, and the plot sets up some funny visuals. Salcedo’s cartoony Photoshop art features well-chosen artifacts from a typical kid’s life and captures the mortification of not fitting in, which will be familiar even to readers who have never experienced breaded fingers or noodle hair. Lumo is brown-skinned and dark-haired; Saffy is pale-skinned with disheveled reddish-brown hair.

Wild and wacky. (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: June 16, 2026

ISBN: 9780063474154

Page Count: 32

Publisher: HarperPop/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: March 23, 2026

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2026

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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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)