Though children might need some reassurance, this beautifully nuanced meditation on the power of nature—and community...
A powerful summer storm careens through a Midwestern farming community in six hours, leaving an uneven wake of destruction.
Geisert’s pictures (wordless except for selected times of day) incorporate vast expanses of sky and earth. Intricate cross sections show the interiors of houses, barns and animal homes. As the storm builds, fox families take to their dens, and rabbits hie to their warrens. A lightning strike cuts off power at 12:15 p.m.; roiling funnel clouds fell trees and pulverize a farmstead on the horizon. A family in a red pickup towing a trailer of baled hay makes deliveries, stopping to help elders prepare. When the truck breaks down, it’s towed and repaired—but the family must shelter under a stone bridge for the worst of the storm. The next spread is the story’s most dramatic—a flash flood sweeps through, propelling house parts, uprooted trees, fences, a tire swing and more. It takes two tense page turns before readers know that the community’s inhabitants are intact: They’ve all gathered to repair the house and barn of hard-hit neighbors. Geisert’s meticulous line compositions are etched onto copperplate, inked and hand-colored. Masterfully, he captures the shifting light as thunderheads build, rain sheets and the night-dark storm moves through.
Though children might need some reassurance, this beautifully nuanced meditation on the power of nature—and community resilience—will reward repeat readings. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: May 7, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-59270-133-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Enchanted Lion Books
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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BOOK REVIEW
Produced to celebrate the National Park Service’s upcoming centenary, a breezy invitation to prospective travelers to “get...
A family road trip through several national parks transforms young Jane’s feelings about missing out on a summer of online fun with her friends.
“There’s absolutely nothing to see here,” Jane emails fretfully as her family drives through the scenic Smoky Mountains and canoes past alligators and manatees in the Everglades. But once her dad gets her to put the tablet away and look through a telescope at the night skies over Big Bend National Park, her attitude transforms: “OH WOW!” Soon she’s tiptoeing over the Grand Canyon’s Skywalk like an acrobat, playing pirate on a raft down the Colorado River, scouting out “Mountain lions, buffalo, and bears. Oh my!” in Yellowstone—and, discovering that she’s misplaced her electronic device, sending written postcards to her friends from Yosemite. Furthermore, once back home, what better way to debrief than a backyard cookout under the stars? Giving blonde Jane and the rest of her white family broad, pleasant features, Rogers sends them smiling and singing their way through a succession of natural wonders, with bears and bald eagles, footnotes (adult supervision required on the Skywalk, for instance), and only a few fellow, occasionally diverse tourists in the background. Endpaper maps track the long itinerary, and a (select) list of other national parks and sites in each state offers more destinations.
Produced to celebrate the National Park Service’s upcoming centenary, a breezy invitation to prospective travelers to “get out there!” (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: May 10, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-246835-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
A song about sharing that’s sure to lift readers’ spirits as well.
A people-watching yellow warbler finds a friend who shares his passion for noticing things.
Maclear chronicles Warble’s increasing frustration as fog blankets his ice-covered island, a “special place” once full of tourists. He can no longer watch the humans who visit his territory, and worse, his neighbors don’t seem to notice or care about the changes. Sadly, he almost forgets the passion of his earlier life until he spots No. 673, a juvenile “Red-Hooded Spectacled Female,” and she becomes a friend. Together they make origami boats and send them out to sea with messages to others beyond his island. Gradually the fog lifts. Pak’s digitally worked pencil-and-watercolor illustrations support and enhance this simple parable, especially in a wordless center spread showing Warble and the girl, who appears to be Asian, staring at each other through binoculars. Humor is to be found in the extensive human identifications that grace the endpapers and early pages of Warble’s story, a nod to the habits of bird-watchers like the author. Pastel wash represents the fog that “turned everything ghostly.” Their surroundings are gray. But as the fog begins to lift, “Big things. / And tiny things / Shiny red things. / And soft feathery things” reappear. Reaching out lifts both fog and spirits; it brightens days and nights.
A song about sharing that’s sure to lift readers’ spirits as well. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: May 16, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-77049-492-3
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Tundra Books
Review Posted Online: April 25, 2017
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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