This well may lead young readers to some pretending of their own.
“Way out west, the warm winds blow.”
A snub-nosed, tousle-haired little white girl narrates life as a cowgirl in poetic, measured rhyme, while appealing paintings rendered in watercolor, gouache, colored pencil, and Photoshop show a day of imaginative play. Simple, catchy text with a repeating line combines with a bright palette full of shiny red to follow the active, enthusiastic youngster and her trusty pup and kitten as she sets out with cowboy boots (rain boots), lasso (jump rope), and horse (hobby horse). Her day includes a visit to the chicken coop (doghouse), chores such as milking the cow (hanging the laundry) and shearing the sheep (brushing the dog), a swim in the creek (inflatable pool), some grub (sandwiches), and sleeping under the stars (they are printed on her blanket). “Home on the range, I’ll close my eyes. / I’ll snuggle up until sunrise. / I’ll sleep beneath the starry skies. / And dream… // that I’m a cowgirl!” While it’s not a novel concept—tomboys, especially white ones, are represented in children’s books aplenty—the charming and energetic story is easy to follow, and the give-and-take between imagination and real life is well-executed.
This well may lead young readers to some pretending of their own. (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4814-5299-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2017
Momo longed to carry the blue umbrella and wear the bright red rubber boots she had been given on her third birthday. But day after day Indian summer continued. Momo tried to tell mother she needed to carry the umbrella to nursery school because the sunshine bothered her eyes. But Mother didn't let her use the umbrella then or when she said the wind bothered her. At last, though, rain fell on the city pavements and Momo carried her umbrella and wore her red boots to school. One feels the urgency of Momo's wish. The pictures are full of the city's moods and the child's joy in a rainy day.
Pub Date: March 1, 1958
ISBN: 978-0-14-050240-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Dec. 9, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1958
Superheroes, and readers, will live happily-ever-after.
Why have fairy tales lasted so long? Maybe it’s because they change with every teller.
It takes surprisingly little effort to turn the Three Little Pigs into superheroes. The Big Bad Wolf basically started out as a supervillain, with the ability to blow a house down, and the pigs had to perform spectacular feats to outwit him. In this picture book, the wolf, locked in the Happily Never After tower, devises a plot to escape. Using rotten eggs and spicy ginger, he creates the Gingerbread Man, who makes his way to a baking contest where the three pigs and other fairy-tale characters are competing to win the key to the city. The Gingerbread Man grabs the key, and not even superhero pigs are fast enough to catch him, but with their secret weapon—mustard (which one of the pigs also uses to bake cookies)—they save the day. The morals: Evil never triumphs, and mustard cookies are delicious. The book’s charm is in the details. There are splotches of mustard on the cookies featured on the endpapers, and a sly-looking mouse is hiding on many of the pages. The story even manages to include more than a dozen fairy-tale figures without seeming frenzied. Evans’ use of shading is so skillful that it almost seems possible to reach out and touch the characters. Most of the human characters are light-skinned. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Superheroes, and readers, will live happily-ever-after. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-338-68221-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2022
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