An intergenerational story with a lot of heart and a few missteps.
Is there such a thing as too much grandparental love?
While the text never explains how Silas, a boy with light skin and brown hair, came to have seven adoring grandparents, have them he does. Nor does the text specify race, but somewhat problematic illustrations indicate that they are a multiracial group of elders. Nana and Oma appear to be white, while Gramma appears black, Opa has light-brown skin (or maybe a tan), Papa’s eyes are not dots like the others’ but lines, perhaps a stereotypical indication that he is Asian, and Granny and Grandad are visually depicted as Native through what some may regard as stereotypical Western dress embellished with feathers and turquoise and positioning near totem poles. They also gift him a dream catcher and take him “to a pow wow and go fishing and canoeing” while the other grandparents offer gifts and activities absent of such broad cultural significance or stereotype. Although Silas loves them dearly, the seven grandparents’ attention can be overwhelming, and when his parents go away he knows he can’t take them all up on their offers to stay with them in their respective homes. The solution? They come stay with him at his house and after busy days, he tucks them in to sleep (though why the closing illustration has them sleeping on the porch is a mystery).
An intergenerational story with a lot of heart and a few missteps. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4598-1640-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Orca
Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2017
A visually striking, engaging picture book that sends the message that everyone counts.
A playful counting book also acts as a celebration of family and human diversity.
Shannon’s text is delivered in spare, rhythmic, lilting verse that begins with one and counts up to 10 as it presents different groupings of things and people in individual families, always emphasizing the unitary nature of each combination. “One is six. One line of laundry. One butterfly’s legs. One family.” Gomez’s richly colored pictures clarify and expand on all that the text lists: For “six,” a picture showing six members of a multigenerational family of color includes a line of laundry with six items hanging from it outside of their windows, as well as the painting of a six-legged butterfly that a child in the family is creating. While text never directs the art to depict diverse individuals and family constellations, Gomez does just this in her illustrations. Interracial families are included, as are depictions of men with their arms around each other, and a Sikh man wearing a turban. This inclusive spirit supports the text’s culminating assertion that “One is one and everyone. One earth. One world. One family.”
A visually striking, engaging picture book that sends the message that everyone counts. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: May 26, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-374-30003-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Frances Foster/Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2015
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The book is available in just about every format--but this is the perfect one.
It's hard to believe that a pop-up wasn't the creators' original intention, so seamlessly do moveable parts dovetail into this modern classic's storyline.
In contrast to the tale's 1998 pop -up version, the figures here move on every page, and with an unusually graceful naturalism to boot. From pulling down Big Nutbrown Hare's ears on the opening spread to make sure he's listening to drowsily turning his head to accept a final good-night kiss in a multi-leveled pull-down tableau at the close, all of Little Nutbrown Hare's hops, stretches and small gestures serve the poetically spare text—as do Big Nutbrown's wider, higher responses to his charge's challenges. As readers turn a flap to read Big Nutbrown's "But I love you this much," his arms extend to demonstrate. The emotional connection between the two hares is clearer than ever in Jeram's peaceful, restrained outdoor scenes, which are slightly larger than those in the trade edition, and the closing scene is made even more intimate by hiding the closing line ("I love you right up to the moon—and back") until an inconspicuous flap is opened up.
The book is available in just about every format--but this is the perfect one. (Pop-up picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-7636-5378-1
Page Count: 16
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2011
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