One of those modest efforts that throws off more light than one might expect from the humble glow of its parts.
Drake the young dragon learns that tradition has two sides, and only one is buttered.
Drake lives with his father, a blustering, flame-belching, butterball-bellied bully in a wife-beater, who has decided that it’s time that Drake “behaved like a real dragon” and “burn a few houses.” “But why?” Drake wonders. “It’s tradition!” Flying over the village in search of a suitable house to immolate, Drake espies a perfect wooden target. Just as he is working up a head of steam, a boy runs out, and they quickly bond over the strictures of parents. “And if you don’t do what he says, will you be told off?” The boy suggests an alternative: the schoolhouse. The students disarm Drake with their admiration, however, and so it goes at each new venue: something intervenes to forestall Drake’s scorched-earth tradition. Lacroix’s narrative is modestly wordy for a picture book but not aimlessly so, and the storyline has a pleasingly low-key humor that neatly displays the blinkered side of tradition. The design of the book, along with Badel’s illustrations—two-page spreads in which a complete page of elegantly wonky watercolor artwork bleeds into the opposite text page—gives the story an exceptional sense of flow. Drake is pudgily adorable, and the humans (all evidently white) have a Quentin Blake–esque air to them.
One of those modest efforts that throws off more light than one might expect from the humble glow of its parts. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 5, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-910277-25-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Words & Pictures
Review Posted Online: June 26, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2017
The story’s slight but allows kids to practice identifying and dealing with their own big feelings.
The diverse group of kids from All Are Welcome (2018) this time gathers in a vacant lot with tools in hand to clear the debris and make something new. But therein lies the rub: What should the something new be? While the exact nature of the disagreement is unfortunately not made clear to readers, the big feelings that the children exhibit are very clear (and for readers who need practice reading facial clues, there’s a labeled chart of 15 in the frontmatter). This book’s refrain is “How can I help? / What can we do?” And the answers, spread over several pages and not spelled out in so many words but rather shown in the illustrations, are: talk it through, compromise, and see things from another perspective. As a guide for dealing with feelings and problem-solving, the book is a bit slim and lacks a solid story to hook readers. But, as with its predecessor, its strength is again the diversity on display in its pages. There’s a rainbow of skin tones and hair colors as well as abundant variation in hair texture, several children exhibit visible disabilities, including one child who uses a wheelchair, and there are markers of religious and cultural diversity. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at 29.6% of actual size.)
The story’s slight but allows kids to practice identifying and dealing with their own big feelings. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: March 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-525-57974-8
Page Count: 42
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Dec. 24, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2021
From curds to riches, from meltdown to uplift—this multicourse romp delivers.
A winning wheel of cheddar with braggadocio to match narrates a tale of comeuppance and redemption.
From humble beginnings among kitchen curds living “quiet lives of pasteurization,” the Big Cheese longs to be the best and builds success and renown based on proven skills and dependable results: “I stuck to the things I was good at.” When newcomer Wedge moves to the village of Curds-on-Whey, the Cheese’s star status wobbles and falls. Turns out that quiet, modest Wedge is also multitalented. At the annual Cheese-cathlon, Wedge bests six-time winner Cheese in every event, from the footrace and chess to hat making and bread buttering. A disappointed Cheese throws a full-blown tantrum before arriving at a moment of truth: Self-calming, conscious breathing permits deep relief that losing—even badly—does not result in disaster. A debrief with Wedge “that wasn’t all about me” leads to further realizations: Losing builds empathy for others; obsession with winning obscures “the joy of participating.” The chastened cheddar learns to reserve bragging for lifting up friends, because anyone can be the Big Cheese. More didactic and less pun-rich than previous entries in the Food Group series, this outing nevertheless couples a cheerful refrain with pithy life lessons that hit home. Oswald’s detailed, comical illustrations continue to provide laughs, including a spot with Cheese onstage doing a “CHED” talk.
From curds to riches, from meltdown to uplift—this multicourse romp delivers. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2023
ISBN: 9780063329508
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
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