An elegant picture book that manages to combine a good story, some natural history, and unusual illustrations. A family goes up Ptarmigan Mountain to pick blueberries: a mother, a father, a pigtailed older sister, and Baby. With full buckets, they discover Baby has lost a shoe, and despite a search for it, it doesn’t turn up. The tiny red sneaker first becomes a nest for a vole, then a plaything for a fox, then a potential morsel for a bear, but in the end, it is covered by earth, seeds, and winter snows. The next year, when the family returns for berry-picking, Baby—walking on his own now—finds his shoe with a blueberry stem growing in it. He carefully carries it home to plant. The illustrations are linocuts in deep rich hues, placed on backgrounds of natural leaf impressions in various matte colors. The sinuous line of the medium is used brilliantly here in the animals’ fur and feathers, the solid, friendly figures of the family, and the stylized but recognizable flora, from blueberries to grasses. A tasty offering, laced with nice surprises. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-88240-518-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
From Johnston (An Old Shell, 1999, etc.), poetic phrases that follow a ghostly barn owl through days and nights, suns and moons. Barn owls have been nesting and roosting, hunting and hatching in the barn and its surroundings for as long as the barn has housed spiders, as long as the wheat fields have housed mice, “a hundred years at least.” The repetition of alliterative words and the hushed hues of the watercolors evoke the soundless, timeless realm of the night owl through a series of spectral scenes. Short, staccato strings of verbs describe the age-old actions and cycles of barn owls, who forever “grow up/and sleep/and wake/and blink/and hunt for mice.” Honey-colored, diffused light glows in contrast to the star-filled night scenes of barn owls blinking awake. A glimpse into the hidden campestral world of the elusive barn owl. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-88106-981-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2000
The gastronomical oddity of eating winged and many-legged creatures is fleetingly examined in a superficial text that looks at animals and people who eat insects. Bugs for breakfast, lunch, and dinner are gobbled up by a shrew, an aardvark, a bear, a gecko, and others. The rhyme scheme limits the information presented; specificity about the types of insects eaten is sacrificed for the sake of making the rhyme flow, e.g., a mouse, a trout, a praying mantis, a nuthatch, and a bat are repeatedly said to eat “bugs” or “insects” in general, rather than naming the mayflies, moths, or grubs they enjoy. An author’s note explains her choice of the word bugs for all crawly things; an addendum takes care of other particulars lacking in the text. Long’s exacting pen-and-ink style lends a naturalistic perfection to this visual playground of the insect world, enhancing this glimpse of vital link in the food chain. (Picture book. 4-7)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-88106-271-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1999
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