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HOW MANY JELLY BEANS?

Name: HOW MANY JELLY BEANS?
Author: Andrea Menotti
ISBN: 978-1-4521-0206-1

A GIANT BOOK OF GIANT NUMBERS!

by Andrea Menotti & illustrated by Yancey Labat ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2012

An eminently child-friendly exploration of an ever-intriguing subject; pair it with David M. Schwartz and Steven Kellogg’s...

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Jellybean-fueled sibling rivalry leads readers on a visual exploration of large numbers.

Emma's request for 10 is reasonable, as is Aiden’s for 20, but, auction-style, the numbers soon mount from 100 to 500, at which point Emma calls Aiden’s bluff. “That’s too many. You can’t eat five hundred jelly beans.” Well, he could eat 1,000 in a year, but that’s just two or three per day. How about 5,000 in a year? That would be a stack that’s as high as a 10-story building. As the two ponder this existential conundrum, the numbers keep going up, from 10,000 to 100,000 to 1,000,000. Labat’s black-and-white digital illustrations make the bright colors of the ever-increasing jellybeans stand out and pop off the pages. The speech bubbles, clean lines and efficiently drawn characters speak to his start in comics. The page depicting how Aiden would divvy 100,000 jellybeans among the different flavors works especially well, picturing single-color circles clearly labeled with the differing amounts (there's only one lemon jellybean). This helps readers learn to estimate, though Bruce Goldstone’s Great Estimations and Greater Estimations (2006, 2008) offer more specific examples.

An eminently child-friendly exploration of an ever-intriguing subject; pair it with David M. Schwartz and Steven Kellogg’s How Much Is a Million. (Math picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: May 1, 2012

ISBN: 978-1-4521-0206-1

Page Count: 28

Publisher: Chronicle Books

Review Posted Online: March 13, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2012

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS

- BOOK REVIEW
POWER OF INVISIBILITY
by Hena Khan & Andrea Menotti ; illustrated by Yancey Labat

- BOOK REVIEW
POWER OF FLIGHT
by Hena Khan & Andrea Menotti ; illustrated by Yancey Labat

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THE THANK YOU BOOK

From the Elephant & Piggie series

by Mo Willems ; illustrated by Mo Willems ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 3, 2016

Thank you, Gerald and Piggie. We’ll miss you

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Piggie is “one lucky pig,” and she’s determined to make sure she thanks “everyone who is important to” her in this, the final Elephant & Piggie book.

Gerald is sure his friend will forget someone—“someone important”—but Piggie assures him, “It will be a THANK-O-RAMA!” Piggie proceeds to thank the Squirrels for their great ideas, Snake for playing ball, and the Pigeon “for never giving up.” Piggie thanks and thanks: “I am a thanking machine!” She thanks character after character, even the Flies (“Any time, dude!”), as Gerald continues to interject that she’ll forget “someone VERY important.” Finally Piggie runs out of thanks, and by this time Gerald is steamed. “I goofed,” Piggie says in itty-bitty type, before lavishing thanks on Gerald. But that’s not whom Piggie forgot to thank! A classic Willems tantrum later, Gerald reveals the “someone important”: “Our reader.” Of course. “We could not be ‘us’ without you,” says Gerald, earnestly looking out from the page, and Piggie chimes in, “You are the best!” As Elephant & Piggie books go, this isn’t one of the strongest, but it is a validating valediction to fans of the two characters, who have won Willems two Geisel Medals and five Honors. Yes, Gerald and Piggie have ushered countless readers into literacy, but as they rightly note, reading is a collaborative act.

Thank you, Gerald and Piggie. We’ll miss you . (Early reader. 5-8)

Pub Date: May 3, 2016

ISBN: 978-1-4231-7828-6

Page Count: 64

Publisher: Hyperion

Review Posted Online: May 9, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
IT'S MY BIRD-DAY!
by Mo Willems ; illustrated by Mo Willems

- BOOK REVIEW
THE MONSTER AND PUPPET SHOW!
by Mo Willems & Kate Micucci ; illustrated by Mo Willems & Kate Micucci

- BOOK REVIEW
THE PIGEON WON'T COUNT TO 10!
by Mo Willems ; illustrated by Mo Willems

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EVERYBODY IN THE RED BRICK BUILDING

by Anne Wynter ; illustrated by Oge Mora ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 12, 2021

Certain to become a favorite bedtime book.

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A crying baby sets off a chain reaction of responses from the neighbors she wakes in the red brick building.

Baby Izzie wakes up in the night with a “WaaaAAH!” Her wail wakes not only those in her apartment, but also neighbor Rayhan, who inadvertently wakes his parrot, who announces: “RraaK! WAKE UP!” The parrot’s squawks and baby’s cries wake more and more neighbors, who rouse others in the building until everyone is awake and contributing to the late-night hullabaloo. Finally, Pepper the cat manages to set off a car alarm that yells “WEE YOOO WEEEE YOOOOO!!!!” into the night. Eventually, all the neighbors—a testament to urban diversity—settle down from the excitement and return to bed. Each is lulled by soft, gentle sounds that begin with the “shhh shhh” of a street sweeper, the “plonk plonk” of falling acorns, and the “ting ting” of a wind chime. The onomatopoeia in this cumulative tale is appropriate for the actions described and is so much fun to read. Mora’s beautiful, vivid geometric illustrations incorporate the onomatopoeia in the first half of the story. They sprawl across spreads and invite loud reading but are absent by the time the story begins to make its turn back to the starting point. That “shhh shhh” sound from the street sweeper brings calm and quiet to the activity in the red brick building—and, as if by magic, readers as well. Sotto voce: very well done! (This book was reviewed digitally.)

Certain to become a favorite bedtime book. (Picture book. 4-8)