Not the slickest app ever, but the art is well worth second and third looks.
An alternate track of instrumental rock adds an unusual dimension to this paraphrased version of the classic female-bondage/abandonment tale.
Working in an ornate Eastern European style, Ukraine-born Pogrebniak creates finely detailed, jewel-toned images of animals (and Thumbelina) dressed in gloriously complex traditional garb and accouterments. He poses them against thickets of flowers, rows of graceful leaves and sumptuously appointed domestic scenes. Though the simplified text reads awkwardly in spots (“Just before wedding Thumbelina went out” to escape the mole and shortly thereafter falls in love with an elf prince who “proposed her”) it properly takes Thumbelina from one male captor to the next as in the original. The special effects are varied, if not always well-designed. They range from a butterfly who twitches when tapped and smoke rings rising from the mole’s pipe to figures that can be moved—but block portions of the text if moved more than a little—and distinct background sounds. On several screens, most notably the climactic and final proposal scene, tapping a musical-note icon exchanges the relatively staid orchestral background music for a funky, if startlingly inappropriate, burst of quick-tempo electric guitar.
Not the slickest app ever, but the art is well worth second and third looks. (iPad storybook app. 7-9)Pub Date: July 29, 2011
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Oleksandr Pogrebniak
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2011
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
An uncomplicated opener, with some funny bits and a clear but not heavy agenda.
Hank Zipzer, poster boy for dyslexic middle graders everywhere, stars in a new prequel series highlighting second-grade trials and triumphs.
Hank’s hopes of playing Aqua Fly, a comic-book character, in the upcoming class play founder when, despite plenty of coaching and preparation, he freezes up during tryouts. He is not particularly comforted when his sympathetic teacher adds a nonspeaking role as a bookmark to the play just for him. Following the pattern laid down in his previous appearances as an older child, he gets plenty of help and support from understanding friends (including Ashley Wong, a new apartment-house neighbor). He even manages to turn lemons into lemonade with a quick bit of improv when Nick “the Tick” McKelty, the sneering classmate who took his preferred role, blanks on his lines during the performance. As the aforementioned bully not only chokes in the clutch and gets a demeaning nickname, but is fat, boastful and eats like a pig, the authors’ sensitivity is rather one-sided. Still, Hank has a winning way of bouncing back from adversity, and like the frequent black-and-white line-and-wash drawings, the typeface is designed with easy legibility in mind.
An uncomplicated opener, with some funny bits and a clear but not heavy agenda. (Fiction. 7-9)Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-448-48239-2
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2014
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