Silly predicaments, strong rhyming verse, amusing illustrations, and a kid’s victory—a pleasing Shabbos tale.
In this picture book, no one can open a grandmother’s jar of gefilte fish until a boy finds a solution.
It’s Shabbos, and Jack’s grandmother Judy, called Bubbe, is making her grandson’s favorite gefilte fish—but first, she has to get the lid off the jar. And that proves just about impossible. Bubbe and Zayde, Jack’s grandfather, try the usual methods with no success, then get friends, relations, and locals to employ their special skills: a bodybuilding neighbor, a mechanic, a doctor (who diagnoses “a dreadful case of / Liddy-stuck-a-tosis!”), and more. Zayde proposes getting a new jar, but the store is closed. Luckily, Jack has an idea: use a magic word. He speaks politely to the jar, the lid opens, and Shabbos dinner is saved. The husband-and-wife team of Allison Marks and Wayne Marks (Og's Ark, 2016) tells a humorous story with rhyming quatrains that scan well: “They lugged it to their auto shop / And schmeared it well with sludge. / But even with a monkey wrench / That lid refused to budge.” A useful glossary, pronunciation guide, recipe for gefilte mini-muffins, and Shabbos song are included. Andriani's (Rome Romp!, 2016, etc.) images are a delight, depicting the tale’s comic misadventures with attractive, mostly soft colors. The pictures have energy and a wealth of witty details, including a fisherman’s piscine-themed decorations and the actions of the family pets, who try to help.
Silly predicaments, strong rhyming verse, amusing illustrations, and a kid’s victory—a pleasing Shabbos tale.Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9908430-0-9
Page Count: 49
Publisher: MB Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 8, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A serene invitation to see and to think about both shape and concept.
A celebration of all things round—mostly in nature but also beneath a cozy blanket, in a circle of friends, encircled by loving arms.
“I love round things,” and “I love to see round things grow.” With expressions of surprise or quiet pleasure in Yoo’s soft, idyllic outdoor scenes, a child with East Asian features plants peas, peeks at the round eggs of a turtle and a ladybug, blows bubbles, points to tree rings and to a huge full moon. Accompanied by her youthful-looking dad (or big brother?), she carries a basket of blueberries, explores a beach, canoes past water-rounded rocks, and chucks pebbles into a pond. With five friends—each showing a different set of ethnic markers—she lies beneath autumn leaves hand in hand, heads in the center of the circle; alone, she curls up under a comforter with a pet and a picture book. The visual tally and terse commentary close with a hug and the circle-closing words “I love round things.” Roundness abounds in Yoo’s mixed-media prints: there are oranges, spirals on a turtle’s shell, the black centers of sunflowers, the concentric rings of a stump. In two pages of backmatter, Sidman goes on to describe how roundness benefits seeds, eggs, and other living things.
A serene invitation to see and to think about both shape and concept. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: March 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-544-38761-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 3, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
Ordinary kids in an extraordinary setting: still a recipe for bright achievements and belly laughs.
Rejoice! 25 years later, Wayside School is still in session, and the children in Mrs. Jewls’ 30th-floor classroom haven’t changed a bit.
The surreal yet oddly educational nature of their misadventures hasn’t either. There are out-and-out rib ticklers, such as a spelling lesson featuring made-up words and a determined class effort to collect 1 million nail clippings. Additionally, mean queen Kathy steps through a mirror that turns her weirdly nice and she discovers that she likes it, a four-way friendship survives a dumpster dive after lost homework, and Mrs. Jewls makes sure that a long-threatened “Ultimate Test” allows every student to show off a special talent. Episodic though the 30 new chapters are, there are continuing elements that bind them—even to previous outings, such as the note to an elusive teacher Calvin has been carrying since Sideways Stories From Wayside School (1978) and finally delivers. Add to that plenty of deadpan dialogue (“Arithmetic makes my brain numb,” complains Dameon. “That’s why they’re called ‘numb-ers,’ ” explains D.J.) and a wild storm from the titular cloud that shuffles the school’s contents “like a deck of cards,” and Sachar once again dishes up a confection as scrambled and delicious as lunch lady Miss Mush’s improvised “Rainbow Stew.” Diversity is primarily conveyed in the illustrations.
Ordinary kids in an extraordinary setting: still a recipe for bright achievements and belly laughs. (Fiction. 9-11)Pub Date: March 3, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-296538-7
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
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