by Arthur Geisert & illustrated by Arthur Geisert ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 20, 2011
A heat wave compels an industrious community of island piggies to build a giant ship, complete with masts and rigging, and voyage to retrieve an Arctic iceberg and cool off. Why is this wooden boat airborne, tethered to an enormous balloon? Welcome to Geisert’s peculiar porcine province! This wordless picture book, full of intricate color etchings, invites readers to loosen up and enjoy a story that makes no sense at all. Some will immediately giggle (clothed pigs frolicking in a pool of iceberg ice-cubes! Ha!), savor myriad quirky details (check out the pigs’ funky angular houses—with skylights!) and expand upon Geisert’s unfettered imagination (how did they get on that little sandy island? a shipwreck?). Many young readers might find the whole foray too inexplicable, too weird and offering too little action. Pigs set up a fan in front of the Arctic ice cube to get some AC at the end...great. Others will simply connect happily with the cheerful can-do attitude of the pigs—whether or not it makes any sense, the last image, of a large pig family enjoying ice water as a cool breeze blows in, two little piggies barely visible under the table, charms. Geisert’s meticulous illustrations won’t amuse everyone, but they certainly conjure a fully realized piggy world—an island at home with itself, floating way out there in the ocean. (Picture book. 4-10)
Pub Date: April 20, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-59270-098-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Enchanted Lion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2011
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More by Lisa Wilke Pope
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by Lisa Wilke Pope ; illustrated by Arthur Geisert
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by Carson Ellis ; illustrated by Carson Ellis ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 24, 2015
Visually accomplished but marred by stereotypical cultural depictions.
Ellis, known for her illustrations for Colin Meloy’s Wildwood series, here riffs on the concept of “home.”
Shifting among homes mundane and speculative, contemporary and not, Ellis begins and ends with views of her own home and a peek into her studio. She highlights palaces and mansions, but she also takes readers to animal homes and a certain famously folkloric shoe (whose iconic Old Woman manages a passel of multiethnic kids absorbed in daring games). One spread showcases “some folks” who “live on the road”; a band unloads its tour bus in front of a theater marquee. Ellis’ compelling ink and gouache paintings, in a palette of blue-grays, sepia and brick red, depict scenes ranging from mythical, underwater Atlantis to a distant moonscape. Another spread, depicting a garden and large building under connected, transparent domes, invites readers to wonder: “Who in the world lives here? / And why?” (Earth is seen as a distant blue marble.) Some of Ellis’ chosen depictions, oddly juxtaposed and stripped of any historical or cultural context due to the stylized design and spare text, become stereotypical. “Some homes are boats. / Some homes are wigwams.” A sailing ship’s crew seems poised to land near a trio of men clad in breechcloths—otherwise unidentified and unremarked upon.
Visually accomplished but marred by stereotypical cultural depictions. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 24, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-7636-6529-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
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More by Randall de Sève
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by Randall de Sève ; illustrated by Carson Ellis
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by Mac Barnett ; illustrated by Carson Ellis
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by Carson Ellis ; illustrated by Carson Ellis
by Amy Krouse Rosenthal ; illustrated by Tom Lichtenheld ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 2015
Although the love comes shining through, the text often confuses in straining for patterned simplicity.
A collection of parental wishes for a child.
It starts out simply enough: two children run pell-mell across an open field, one holding a high-flying kite with the line “I wish you more ups than downs.” But on subsequent pages, some of the analogous concepts are confusing or ambiguous. The line “I wish you more tippy-toes than deep” accompanies a picture of a boy happily swimming in a pool. His feet are visible, but it's not clear whether he's floating in the deep end or standing in the shallow. Then there's a picture of a boy on a beach, his pockets bulging with driftwood and colorful shells, looking frustrated that his pockets won't hold the rest of his beachcombing treasures, which lie tantalizingly before him on the sand. The line reads: “I wish you more treasures than pockets.” Most children will feel the better wish would be that he had just the right amount of pockets for his treasures. Some of the wordplay, such as “more can than knot” and “more pause than fast-forward,” will tickle older readers with their accompanying, comical illustrations. The beautifully simple pictures are a sweet, kid- and parent-appealing blend of comic-strip style and fine art; the cast of children depicted is commendably multiethnic.
Although the love comes shining through, the text often confuses in straining for patterned simplicity. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4521-2699-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2015
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More by Amy Krouse Rosenthal
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by Amy Krouse Rosenthal & Christy Webster ; illustrated by Brigette Barrager & Chiara Fiorentino
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by Tom Lichtenheld & Amy Krouse Rosenthal ; illustrated by Tom Lichtenheld
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by Amy Krouse Rosenthal ; illustrated by Mike Yamada
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