by Amanda Wood & Mike Jolley ; illustrated by Dinara Mirtalipova ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 5, 2018
Unsuitable for school or public library shelves but giftworthy starter kits for budding Braques and preschool Pollocks.
Nine prepared scratchboards packaged with a wooden stylus offer invitations to reveal a thematic set of artist’s scenes or, with selective scraping, add customized shapes and patterns to each.
Beneath a layer of removable black into which the outlines of hummingbirds, orchids, leopards, and other jungle flora and fauna are drawn as guidelines, Mirtalipova’s stylized pictures shimmer with pattern and color—which children can see for themselves by mechanically removing the entire layer or, if they so choose, alter (in limited ways) by scraping lines, spots, or stripes of their own. The pencil-shaped stylus, pointed at one end and chisel-ended at the other, comes in a reusable plastic cradle and definitely merits the cautionary hazard notices on the front and back covers. Like the co-published Enchanted Garden (and the other entries in this series), opposite each picture is a set of instructions that mix visual and verbal hints (some in rhyme: “What else is there for you to see? / A lizard climbing up the tree…”) that are capped at the end with an invitation to regard the illustrations as “your own work of art.” Fair enough, though they are really more like cooperative ventures.
Unsuitable for school or public library shelves but giftworthy starter kits for budding Braques and preschool Pollocks. (Novelty. 4-8)Pub Date: July 5, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-78603-141-9
Page Count: 20
Publisher: Wide Eyed Editions
Review Posted Online: June 10, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018
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by Amanda Wood ; illustrated by Vikki Chu ; photographed by Bec Winnel
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by Amanda Wood ; illustrated by Vikki Chu ; photographed by Bec Winnel
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by Amanda Wood & Mike Jolley ; illustrated by Allan Sanders
by Andy Rash ; illustrated by Andy Rash ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 5, 2023
Sure to have readers booking their own trips to catch the next brief but memorable solar eclipse.
A total solar eclipse brings a father and son closer together.
After learning in school about the eclipse’s impending arrival, a curious young boy excitedly figures out the best time and place to see it. His father agrees to transport him to the woods to view the eclipse, and the child describes everything that happens at various points—two months before the eclipse, then a month, a week, a day, an hour, a minute, and the exciting second before the sun slips behind the moon. Time seems to stand still, and the creatures in the woods are baffled by what appears to be an early nightfall. Then the countdown begins again, with the boy describing what happens after the eclipse—one second, one minute, one hour, one day, one year, and even longer. The moment has become a shared memory that enhances the bond between father and son and inspires future eclipse-chasing expeditions. Based on the author’s actual experience with his own son in 2017, this picture book features lively, child-friendly digital artwork filled with scenes of nature, matter-of-fact text that acknowledges the awesomeness of this rare phenomenon, and useful maps that chart the solar eclipse of 2017 and projected paths for future eclipses. Father and son are light-skinned. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Sure to have readers booking their own trips to catch the next brief but memorable solar eclipse. (more information on eclipses) (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 5, 2023
ISBN: 9781338608823
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2023
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by Caron Levis ; illustrated by Andy Rash
by Andrew Knapp ; illustrated by Andrew Knapp ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 6, 2024
A well-meaning but lackluster tribute.
Readers bid farewell to a beloved canine character.
Momo is—or was—an adorable and very photogenic border collie owned by author Knapp. The many readers who loved him in the previous half-dozen books are in for a shock with this one. “Momo had died” is the stark reality—and there are no photographs of him here. Instead, Momo has been replaced by a flat cartoonish pastiche with strange, staring round white eyes, inserted into some of Knapp’s photography (which remains appealing, insofar as it can be discerned under the mixed media). Previous books contained few or no words. Unfortunately, virtuosity behind a lens does not guarantee mastery of verse. The art here is accompanied by words that sometimes rhyme but never find a workable or predictable rhythm (“We’d fetch and we’d catch, / we’d run and we’d jump. Every day we found new / games to play”). It’s a pity, because the subject—a pet’s death—is an important one to address with children. Of course, Momo isn’t gone; he can still be found “everywhere” in memories. But alas, he can be found here only in the crude depictions of the darling dog so well known from the earlier books.
A well-meaning but lackluster tribute. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781683693864
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Quirk Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
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by Andrew Knapp ; photographed by Andrew Knapp
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