What’s a boy to do when his mother is a trapeze artist, she practices in the living room, and all he wants to do is watch TV with his friends? “Everyone calls my house The Big Top,” Carter (Under a Prairie Sky, not reviewed, etc.) begins. “Kids knock at the window, wanting to play. Today it’s Dan and Nisha, little Stuie holding his bear.” Fitzgerald’s (The Little Rooster and the Diamond Button, 2001, etc.) expressive watercolor vignettes depict the neighbor children with wide eyes; when they join the boy narrator in the living room, they look a little nervous. Meanwhile, the boy sits staring at the set. “Why can’t I have an ordinary mom?” he wonders as the children watch his mother’s moves. Despite her larger-than-life presence, Fitzgerald shows the mother only in shadow, inviting readers to imagine the graceful shapes she takes on her swing above the sofa. She comes into full view—albeit in the background—when the children discover the boy’s “Circus Costume Box,” and are transformed, literally, into an elephant, lion, and lion tamer. A series of wordless double-paged spreads depict the trio in action. However, the boy is transformed as well. While he initially opts out, he joins in the activity when he hears the children’s blasphemous plan to enter outer space (“A circus has cannons, not rocket ships”), upholding the integrity of the family business. The first-person perspective makes the telling slightly awkward, but the story may resonate with children who feel set apart from their peers, especially with an offbeat parent. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2002
ISBN: 1-55143-225-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Orca
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2002
A validating and breathtaking next chapter of a Mother Goose favorite.
Humpty Dumpty, classically portrayed as an egg, recounts what happened after he fell off the wall in Santat’s latest.
An avid ornithophile, Humpty had loved being atop a high wall to be close to the birds, but after his fall and reassembly by the king’s men, high places—even his lofted bed—become intolerable. As he puts it, “There were some parts that couldn’t be healed with bandages and glue.” Although fear bars Humpty from many of his passions, it is the birds he misses the most, and he painstakingly builds (after several papercut-punctuated attempts) a beautiful paper plane to fly among them. But when the plane lands on the very wall Humpty has so doggedly been avoiding, he faces the choice of continuing to follow his fear or to break free of it, which he does, going from cracked egg to powerful flight in a sequence of stunning spreads. Santat applies his considerable talent for intertwining visual and textual, whimsy and gravity to his consideration of trauma and the oft-overlooked importance of self-determined recovery. While this newest addition to Santat’s successes will inevitably (and deservedly) be lauded, younger readers may not notice the de-emphasis of an equally important part of recovery: that it is not compulsory—it is OK not to be OK.
A validating and breathtaking next chapter of a Mother Goose favorite. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-62672-682-6
Page Count: 45
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A book that will make young dog-owners smile in recognition and confirm dogless readers' worst suspicions about the mayhem caused by pets, even winsome ones. Sam, who bears passing resemblance to an affable golden retriever, is praised for fetching the family newspaper, and goes on to fetch every other newspaper on the block. In the next story, only the children love Sam's swimming; he is yelled at by lifeguards and fishermen alike when he splashes through every watering hole he can find. Finally, there is woe to the entire family when Sam is bored and lonely for one long night. Boland has an essential message, captured in both both story and illustrations of this Easy-to-Read: Kids and dogs belong together, especially when it's a fun-loving canine like Sam. An appealing tale. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-8037-1530-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1996
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