HAVE YOU SEEN MY EGG?

Name: HAVE YOU SEEN MY EGG?
Author: Andrew Fairchild
ISBN: 978-1-5136-1965-1

by Andrew Fairchild illustrated by Melissa Shultz-Jones ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 13, 2017

An animal fable—with beautiful watercolor images—about following your dreams when others tell you to quit that never quite...

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A resolute rooster decides to adopt an egg in this illustrated barnyard tale.

Red the rooster wakes up one morning from a repeated dream: he’s sure he’s meant to have an egg. The hens consider him ridiculous: “When will you give up this crazy idea?” Roosters, they tell him, “don’t have eggs!” Dejected, Red walks away, but he talks himself into a quest to find his egg. First, he looks in the garden. No egg there; the valiant Rabbit tries to give him a tomato instead. Frog looks in the pond, but only discovers a pebble. Cat, dressed like a fairy princess complete with a beribboned wand, helps Red survey the barn. When they spy a ball of yarn, Owl gets involved, but merely repeats the wisdom of the hens: roosters don’t have eggs. Still, Red is so determined to succeed that he walks out into a storm. There, in a stream in a ditch, he sees an egg floating with the current. Even though he can’t swim, he fearlessly rescues the egg, bringing it home. The play against gender expectations, in which Red, a male, is devoted to locating and caring for his own egg, is charming, and a nice inspiration for all young readers drawn to nurturing, even if they’re told otherwise. But Fairchild’s (Rose and Her Amazing Nose, 2015) plot hangs together loosely, with the egg appearing suddenly and for no reason. Young critical thinkers would be wise to wonder what is in the egg that Red has saved, and to notice that he misses his morning responsibilities to look after it. Many children, however, will just be charmed by debut illustrator Shultz-Jones’ delightfully designed farm animals, including the Owl in dinosaur footie pajamas.

An animal fable—with beautiful watercolor images—about following your dreams when others tell you to quit that never quite delves into the consequences.

Pub Date: Feb. 13, 2017

ISBN: 978-1-5136-1965-1

Page Count: -

Publisher: 4Kidz Publishing

Review Posted Online: June 1, 2017

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

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HOW TÍA LOLA CAME TO (VISIT) STAY

From the Tía Lola Stories series , Vol. 1

by Julia Alvarez ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

Simple, bella, un regalo permenente: simple and beautiful, a gift that will stay.

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Renowned Latin American writer Alvarez has created another story about cultural identity, but this time the primary character is 11-year-old Miguel Guzmán.

When Tía Lola arrives to help the family, Miguel and his hermana, Juanita, have just moved from New York City to Vermont with their recently divorced mother. The last thing Miguel wants, as he's trying to fit into a predominantly white community, is a flamboyant aunt who doesn't speak a word of English. Tía Lola, however, knows a language that defies words; she quickly charms and befriends all the neighbors. She can also cook exotic food, dance (anywhere, anytime), plan fun parties, and tell enchanting stories. Eventually, Tía Lola and the children swap English and Spanish ejercicios, but the true lesson is "mutual understanding." Peppered with Spanish words and phrases, Alvarez makes the reader as much a part of the "language" lessons as the characters. This story seamlessly weaves two culturaswhile letting each remain intact, just as Miguel is learning to do with his own life. Like all good stories, this one incorporates a lesson just subtle enough that readers will forget they're being taught, but in the end will understand themselves, and others, a little better, regardless of la lengua nativa—the mother tongue.

Simple, bella, un regalo permenente: simple and beautiful, a gift that will stay. (Fiction. 9-11)

Pub Date: March 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-375-80215-0

Page Count: 160

Publisher: Knopf

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001

Categories:

CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

- BOOK REVIEW
ALREADY A BUTTERFLY
by Julia Alvarez ; illustrated by Raúl Colón

- BOOK REVIEW
WHERE DO THEY GO?
by Julia Alvarez ; illustrated by Sabra Field

- BOOK REVIEW
HOW TÍA LOLA ENDED UP STARTING OVER
by Julia Alvarez

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THE LORAX

by Dr. Seuss ; illustrated by Dr. Seuss ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 12, 1971

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The greening of Dr. Seuss, in an ecology fable with an obvious message but a savingly silly style. In the desolate land of the Lifted Lorax, an aged creature called the Once-ler tells a young visitor how he arrived long ago in the then glorious country and began manufacturing anomalous objects called Thneeds from "the bright-colored tufts of the Truffula Trees." Despite protests from the Lorax, a native "who speaks for the trees," he continues to chop down Truffulas until he drives away the Brown Bar-ba-loots who had fed on the Tuffula fruit, the Swomee-Swans who can't sing a note for the smogulous smoke, and the Humming-Fish who had hummed in the pond now glumped up with Gluppity-Glupp. As for the Once-let, "1 went right on biggering, selling more Thneeds./ And I biggered my money, which everyone needs" — until the last Truffula falls. But one seed is left, and the Once-let hands it to his listener, with a message from the Lorax: "UNLESS someone like you/ cares a whole awful lot,/ nothing is going to get better./ It's not." The spontaneous madness of the old Dr. Seuss is absent here, but so is the boredom he often induced (in parents, anyway) with one ridiculous invention after another. And if the Once-let doesn't match the Grinch for sheer irresistible cussedness, he is stealing a lot more than Christmas and his story just might induce a generation of six-year-olds to care a whole lot.