It may feel as though there are a few too many dinosaur picture books around, but for how well this one brings lovable Sadie...
The canon of books about oversized and/or inappropriate pets for kids gets yet another addition, but with a dinosaur, this one rises above the herd.
At an animal shelter, Ben can’t decide from among more than 20 “cute dogs and funny dogs and loud dogs and smelly dogs,” but the giant Tyrannosaurus rex in a nearby cage seems just right. Ben calls her “Sadie,” Sadie goes, “ROAR!” and, of course, it’s love at first pet sighting. Things get complicated when it comes to feeding, disposing of dinosaur waste, and even bathing, when Sadie drinks the contents of an entire lake. But the dinosaur comes in handy foiling a fruit-stand robbery, turning Sadie from a town pariah to a beloved fixture: “The most popular dog in town.” The text plays out the drama and redemption in simple, understated prose that gives free rein to Hawkes’ wildly expressive illustrations of Sadie. While brown-skinned, black-haired Ben and the other humans of the book are drawn with dot eyes and in small scale, Sadie is impressively detailed, with big, kind eyes, complexly shaded skin, and a seemingly endless range of emotion. She grins with satisfaction, fetches a robber with steely determination, and enjoys a tickle with a floppy tongue hanging out and feet wiggling in the air.
It may feel as though there are a few too many dinosaur picture books around, but for how well this one brings lovable Sadie to life, it deserves a place on the shelf. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-8050-9706-1
Page Count: 45
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: April 30, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2017
Serve this superbly designed title to all who relish slightly scary stories.
Kids know vegetables can be scary, but rarely are edible roots out to get someone. In this whimsical mock-horror tale, carrots nearly frighten the whiskers off Jasper Rabbit, an interloper at Crackenhopper Field.
Jasper loves carrots, especially those “free for the taking.” He pulls some in the morning, yanks out a few in the afternoon, and comes again at night to rip out more. Reynolds builds delicious suspense with succinct language that allows understatements to be fully exploited in Brown’s hilarious illustrations. The cartoon pictures, executed in pencil and then digitally colored, are in various shades of gray and serve as a perfectly gloomy backdrop for the vegetables’ eerie orange on each page. “Jasper couldn’t get enough carrots … / … until they started following him.” The plot intensifies as Jasper not only begins to hear the veggies nearby, but also begins to see them everywhere. Initially, young readers will wonder if this is all a product of Jasper’s imagination. Was it a few snarling carrots or just some bathing items peeking out from behind the shower curtain? The ending truly satisfies both readers and the book’s characters alike. And a lesson on greed goes down like honey instead of a forkful of spinach.
Serve this superbly designed title to all who relish slightly scary stories. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 21, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4424-0297-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2012
Chilling in the best ways.
When a young rabbit who’s struggling in school finds a helpful crayon, everything is suddenly perfect—until it isn’t.
Jasper is flunking everything except art and is desperate for help when he finds the crayon. “Purple. Pointy…perfect”—and alive. When Jasper watches TV instead of studying, he misspells every word on his spelling test, but the crayon seems to know the answers, and when he uses the crayon to write, he can spell them all. When he faces a math quiz after skipping his homework, the crayon aces it for him. Jasper is only a little creeped out until the crayon changes his art—the one area where Jasper excels—into something better. As guilt-ridden Jasper receives accolade after accolade for grades and work that aren’t his, the crayon becomes more and more possessive of Jasper’s attention and affection, and it is only when Jasper cannot take it anymore that he discovers just what he’s gotten himself into. Reynolds’ text might as well be a Rod Serling monologue for its perfectly paced foreboding and unsettling tension, both gentled by lightly ominous humor. Brown goes all in to match with a grayscale palette for everything but the purple crayon—a callback to black-and-white sci-fi thrillers as much as a visual cue for nascent horror readers. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Chilling in the best ways. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 23, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5344-6588-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 24, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2022
PERSPECTIVES
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
