A charming introduction to flowering plants, this is an obvious addition to a nature-themed storytime that can also can be...
A celebration of flowers in poetry and photographic imagery.
Sayre’s latest feast for the eye and ear focuses on blooming plants, showing their emergence, their growth, their beauty, and their profusion in certain places and times, especially spring. Very short couplets (“Seeds sprout. / Stems pop out”; “Leaves emerge / stalks surge”) are printed in large, legible text directly on each photo, which fills a page or spread. The titular refrain, “Bloom, boom!” follows each couplet. Carefully composed photographs vary in subject and perspective, from fields of flowers to striking close-ups of shoots, leaves, buds, and blossoms. She shows surprising desert blooms, spring wildflowers, garden tulips, and flowering trees. Just when the pattern begins to feel repetitive she begins to include more animals in her images: a bumblebee on a lupine, a chickadee and a butterfly on flowering trees, and a lizard sunning itself, and she changes up her refrain, just once. The California poppies shown close-up on the cover stretch out on a hillside at the blooming, booming conclusion. The rhyme and rhythm of the text invite reading aloud; the pictures show well even across a room. This easy-to-grasp botany lesson is supplemented with backmatter offering older readers more information about the bloom boom and about each photograph.
A charming introduction to flowering plants, this is an obvious addition to a nature-themed storytime that can also can be read alone by budding readers. (web resources) (Informational picture book. 3-8)Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4814-9472-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2018
A lyrical and educational look at the water cycle.
Through many types of weather and the different seasons, water tells readers about its many forms.
“Sometimes I’m the rain cloud / and sometimes I’m the rain.” Water can make rainbows and can appear to be different colors. Water is a waterfall, a wave, an ocean swell, a frozen pond, the snow on your nose, a cloud, frost, a comet, a part of you. Throughout, Paterson’s rhyming verses evoke images of their own: “Soon the summer sun is back / and warms me with its rays. / I rise in rumbling thunderheads / like castles in the haze,” though at times word order seems to have been chosen for rhyme rather than meaning (“In fall I sink into a fog / and blanket chilly fields, / with pumpkins touched by morning frost / the harvest season yields”). Backmatter includes a diagram of the water cycle that introduces and describes each step with solid vocabulary, including “Collection” as a step in the process; “The Science Behind the Poetry,” which unpacks some of the poetic language and phrases; some water activities and explorations; conservation tips; and a list of other books from the publisher about water. Paterson’s full- and double-page–spread illustrations are just as magical as his verse, showing water in its many forms from afar and close up. Few people appear on his pages, but the vast majority of those are people of color.
A lyrical and educational look at the water cycle. (Informational picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: March 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-58469-615-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Dawn Publications
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A good introduction to observation, data, and trying again.
Cece loves asking “why” and “what if.”
Her parents encourage her, as does her science teacher, Ms. Curie (a wink to adult readers). When Cece and her best friend, Isaac, pair up for a science project, they choose zoology, brainstorming questions they might research. They decide to investigate whether dogs eat vegetables, using Cece’s schnauzer, Einstein, and the next day they head to Cece’s lab (inside her treehouse). Wearing white lab coats, the two observe their subject and then offer him different kinds of vegetables, alone and with toppings. Cece is discouraged when Einstein won’t eat them. She complains to her parents, “Maybe I’m not a real scientist after all….Our project was boring.” Just then, Einstein sniffs Cece’s dessert, leading her to try a new way to get Einstein to eat vegetables. Cece learns that “real scientists have fun finding answers too.” Harrison’s clean, bright illustrations add expression and personality to the story. Science report inserts are reminiscent of The Magic Schoolbus books, with less detail. Biracial Cece is a brown, freckled girl with curly hair; her father is white, and her mother has brown skin and long, black hair; Isaac and Ms. Curie both have pale skin and dark hair. While the book doesn’t pack a particularly strong emotional or educational punch, this endearing protagonist earns a place on the children’s STEM shelf.
A good introduction to observation, data, and trying again. (glossary) (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: June 19, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-249960-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2018
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