Visually lively with an engaging story; here’s hoping the next installment exhibits greater diversity.
Following The Not-So Itty-Bitty Spiders (2015), twins Olive and Beatrix return for another adventure featuring magic and science in this illustrated early chapter book.
Olive (“an ordinary girl,” as she informs readers—Olive narrates the story) and her best friend, Eddie, love science, and they look forward to presenting their projects at the school’s annual science fair. But Beatrix, who is a witch, uses her magic powers to create projects that always win the blue ribbon. This year though, Olive has worked extra hard and is certain she will win. On the day of the fair, the twins carry their projects (“the exciting world of MOLD” and “cloud made with science”) to school early and jostle for the same display table—and both projects crash to the ground. Olive’s mold and Beatrix’s cloud combine to create an out-of-control slime that the twins and Eddie must use their combined resources to combat. The story has imaginative action and characters that model working together and respecting each other’s talents despite philosophical differences, but it lacks notably diverse characters. Just showing a few characters as grayish doesn’t make an impact. The book’s visual format is lively, combining spot illustrations with full-page and double-page spreads and dialogue bubbles.
Visually lively with an engaging story; here’s hoping the next installment exhibits greater diversity. (activities) (Fantasy. 6-8)Pub Date: March 29, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-81485-0
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Branches/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A lovely vision for small, sensitive existentialists.
Under the desert night sky, Dad helps his child find cosmic comfort.
The vast universe has made a child feel too small despite their close family. Until, the young narrator tells us, they and their father pack their old pickup, driving through the “rubber and french fries” smell of the city and the “sweet and smoky” mountain scent to camp off-road in a remote arroyo. Together they see tiny beetle prints, jump in sand dunes, name birds, build a fire, watch the sunset, and stretch out in the truck bed. A thoughtful, small human, the child admits to being scared of “how big the universe is and how it goes on and on forever.” But equally thoughtful Dad explains that stars, beetles, birds, and even people are made of energy. Angst is not easily tamed, but snuggling and giving the constellations idiosyncratic names help, as does Mom’s back-at-home surprise: glowing stars covering the narrator’s room. In this bed under the stars, this budding philosopher finally feels “at home here in the universe.” It’s a quiet, contemplative tale that might not strike a chord with all readers but will reassure those who share the protagonist’s worries. Delicate, realistic art plays warm orange and brown hues against blues from pale to indigo, balancing (living) warmth and (interstellar) distance. The child and family are light-skinned and redheaded. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A lovely vision for small, sensitive existentialists. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: April 4, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-5362-1239-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2023
Lovely and evocative, just the thing to spark an interest in the original and its sequels—and the upcoming film sequel, Mary...
Refined, spit-spot–tidy illustrations infuse a spare adaptation of the 1934 classic with proper senses of decorum and wonder.
Novesky leaves out much—the Bird Woman, Adm. Boom, that ethnically problematic world tour, even Mr. and Mrs. Banks—but there’s still plenty going on. Mary Poppins introduces Jane and Michael (their twin younger sibs are mentioned but seem to be left at home throughout) to the Match-Man and the buoyant Mr. Wigg, lets them watch Mrs. Corry and her daughters climb tall ladders to spangle the night sky with gilt stars, and takes them to meet the zoo animals (“Bird and beast, star and stone—we are all one,” says the philosophical bear). At last, when the wind changes, she leaves them with an “Au revoir!” (“Which means, Dear Reader, ‘to meet again.’ ”) Slender and correct, though with dangling forelocks that echo and suggest the sweeping curls of wind that bring her in and carry her away, Mary Poppins takes the role of impresario in Godbout’s theatrically composed scenes, bearing an enigmatic smile throughout but sharing with Jane and Michael (and even the parrot-headed umbrella) an expression of wide-eyed, alert interest as she shepherds them from one marvelous encounter to the next. The Corrys have brown skin; the rest of the cast presents white.
Lovely and evocative, just the thing to spark an interest in the original and its sequels—and the upcoming film sequel, Mary Poppins Returns, which opens in December 2018. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-328-91677-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
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