Sayre and Jenkins (Vulture View, 2007, etc.) collaborate again, here exploring the habits of squirrels.
Four squirrel species native to the U.S. are introduced, but Jenkins’ cut-paper collages focus on the eastern fox squirrel. Sayre’s simple verses are delivered in short, staccato rhythms, occasionally asking readers to speculate or reflect. “Squirrels chirp. / Squirrels drink. / Can you guess / what squirrels think?” (A groundhog is pictured, without comment, in the accompanying spread.) The pictures nimbly extend the compressed text, showing a squirrel fleeing an avian predator and digging to bury acorns. An ensuing spread shows a row of acorns, buried in the earth below a dusting of snow. “Five are hidden. / Will they sprout?” A page turn shows four acorns in various stages of sprouting, while the fifth, sporting a small hole in its surface, remains inert. Additional information about squirrel habitat is appended, along with suggestions for fostering it by planting trees.
Apt verse and appealing visuals provide young naturalists with a springboard for discussion and further discovery. (notes, bibliography of adult sources, website) (Informational picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8050-9251-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2016
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 29, 2018
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS
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Serve this superbly designed title to all who relish slightly scary stories.
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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 2, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2012
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS
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