No toxic discourse here—Murguia’s rodents model what it means to agree to disagree.
Up with polka dots! Down with prairie dogs! Can’t Mouse and Squirrel agree on anything?
Drums or guitars? Why bother?—humming is obviously better. Mouse (clad in blue polka-dot trousers) loves a clear blue sky, but Squirrel (in a red knit cap) is partial to dark, gray clouds. Who cares if Mouse likes bikes—Squirrel knows that hiking’s the way to go. Tensions rise with each heated exchange of opinions until, faced with their irreconcilable differences, the two rodents march off in a huff. But wait—the frenemies realize, midstep, that being different needn’t be an impediment to friendship, and disagreement doesn’t have to be an inevitable deal breaker. Written as verse for two voices, the text presents Mouse’s upbeat questions and Squirrel’s grumpy rejoinders in an abcb rhyme scheme. The snappy meter, encapsulated in blue and salmon speech bubbles, perfectly reflects the growing frustration between the furry protagonists. Murguia’s gray-toned drawings against expanses of white negative space effectively focus readers’ attention on the silliness of the situation. She comically captures the gradual shift of the aggrieved rodents’ expressions as they transform from benign curiosity to mutual outrage. In this time of destructive divisiveness, Mouse and Squirrel’s journey toward respecting their differences is an important lesson for us all.
No toxic discourse here—Murguia’s rodents model what it means to agree to disagree. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: Aug. 25, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3880-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2020
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.
A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.
Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
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