MacDonald’s (No More Nasty, 2001, etc.) dazzling verse, clever as Scheherazade, is a beautiful choreography of words. Here we have Quentin Fenton Herter Third—wonderfully staid in Potter’s (Shrinking Violet, 2001, etc.) dotty artwork, all puckered puss, spray of freckles, and enough pomade to lube a Bentley—a boy righteous and well-mannered. “He always did what he should ought / and never did what he should not.” But QFH Third has a significant other, his shadow: Quentin Fenton Herter Three, a rude boy who never knew a glass that couldn’t be spilled or an aunt who couldn’t be appalled. “And—sad but true—he never flossed!” Both boys share a longing: to be a little bit like the other, just a splash. Which they get a chance to do when QFH Third commits an unfettered sneeze that fairly blows his aunts from the tea table; he gets his walking papers and QFH Three gets a chance to strut his politesse. It’s all very merry, with the illustrations providing an unending source of enjoyment while the verse positively scoots along: “The scene was like an atom blast. / The ladies stood (like you) aghast / amid remains of their repast.” Not to mention the laughter that readers will shower down upon them. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: April 5, 2002
ISBN: 0-374-36170-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Melanie Kroupa/Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2002
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
What if the market was closed when you wanted to bake a pie? You could embark for Europe, learn Italian en route, and pick up some semolina wheat in Italy, an egg in France, kurundu bark for cinnamon in Sri Lanka, and an entire cow in England (butter) before coming home via Jamaica (sugar) and Vermont (apples). The expertly designed illustrations in which a dark-haired lass journeys by various means to these interesting places to get her groceries are lovely and lively, and the narrative, too, travels at a spritely pace. The journey is neither quite logical enough to be truly informative nor quite bizarre enough to be satisfyingly silly, while the rich, sweet recipe that's appended will take some adult assistance. Still, fun. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: May 2, 1994
ISBN: 0-679-83705-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1994
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