Avast, there! A “cruel and evil” pirate who “roamed the world and seven seas in search of dirty socks” meets his match at last. Who could that be? “ ‘It’s Stinky Annie,’ someone said, ‘and her band of smelly varmints. / She captures every boat she can and takes their undergarments.’ ” A brisk battle ensues, but once they notice that their female adversaries are fighting barefoot, Dirty Joe’s men lose heart, and then briefs. Joe and Stinky Annie look like woolly redheaded twins in Davis’s uproarious nautical scenes, and no wonder, as they turn out to be long-separated sibs. Annie shows no mercy, though, and off Joe must go to his home near the Bay of Fundy—“He’s not a pirate any more, because he has no undies.” Singer/storyteller Harley (who has recorded a version of this) caps his tale with the sage observation that “If you’ve got an older sister, then I feel bad for you, / ‘Cause just as long as she’s alive, she’ll tell you what to do.” Clever rhyming, plus illustrations filled with colorfully clad pirates and soiled laundry hoist the audience appeal here to the tiptop of the mast. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-06-623780-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Multiple taps transform a giggling block of wood in Geppetto’s workshop into a skinny, loose jointed puppet that suddenly...
Unusually brisk special effects animate this relatively less satiric but equally amusing adaptation of the classic tale.
Multiple taps transform a giggling block of wood in Geppetto’s workshop into a skinny, loose jointed puppet that suddenly delivers a Bronx cheer and then whirls away on a long series of misadventures. These culminate in a final change into a flesh-and-blood boy with help from a fingertip “paintbrush.” Quick and responsive touch- or tilt-activated features range from controllable marionettes, Pinocchio’s tattletale nose and Fire-Eater’s explosive sneeze to a movable candle that illuminates both Geppetto in the fish’s dark belly and the accompanying block of text. Even the thumbnail page images of the index (which opens any time with a shake of the tablet) tumble about, somehow without falling out of order. Though transitions are almost nonexistent in the episodic plot, the text is both substantial enough to have a definite presence and artfully placed in and around Conversi’s brightly colored settings and toylike figures. Text is available in English or Italian with a clear, understated optional audio narration backed by unobtrusive music. A link on the credits page leads to downloadable coloring sheets on the producer’s website.Pub Date: March 17, 2011
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Elastico srl
Review Posted Online: July 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Transitioning readers will feel accomplished and will surely look for future volumes to see what happens in Mia’s new life.
In this first volume of a new chapter-book series, a little girl named Mia discovers she’s a superhero.
Mia Macarooney is “a total disaster machine.” Everywhere she goes, chaos and mayhem follow (literally, in the case of Chaos—that’s the name of her cat). Except now she’s received an unusual letter, inviting her to the Program for In Training Superheroes, and she is totally bowled over. It turns out her accidents are often results of her superpowers, which she will learn to hone in her after-school hours at the PITS. As if that weren’t enough of a shock, Mia’s parents deliver the thrilling news that they are superheroes too! Her father is fluent in animal speech, and her mother can fly. Everything moves quickly at the PITS. Mia embarrasses herself in front of everyone during the entrance exam but ends up feeling supported and ready to learn…in the next volume. Freckled, brown-skinned, curly-fro–sporting Mia is an adorable protagonist. An overuse of exclamation points keeps the adrenaline running without a steady stream of exciting events—or even a climax and resolution—but with the large, bold type and the cute illustrations full of personality, emerging readers will be happy to read this book independently. What’s more exciting than that?
Transitioning readers will feel accomplished and will surely look for future volumes to see what happens in Mia’s new life. (Fantasy. 5-8)Pub Date: Dec. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3270-3
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2018
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