Pictured in a long spate of silkscreen tableaux bound up in a small, bricklike volume, a bored child’s daydream zigzags its way into an increasingly wild fantasy adventure.
Printed (seemingly) on rough denim, the grainy, stylized scenes are designed to be understood at a glance and paged through quickly. Staid opening images of a school, a road and a house are transformed by both increasing detail and the appearances of new characters. These range from a pair of bandits and a witch to a duster-wearing stranger, police officers, soldiers, a dragon and others. Even as both characters and visual complexity multiply, readers are further shaken up by scenery occasionally being turned upside down and later sideways. Ultimately, the stranger becomes a protagonist who escapes various dangers, discovers treasure and rescues a princess from a sorcerer. With her, he defeats the witch amid bolts of spell-cast lightning…and comes home at last. Aside from allusive chapter heads—“A hero is revealed. During a long and perilous journey several scores are settled. In the forest, night itself is an enchantress”—the narrative is entirely composed of one- or two-word identifiers beneath each picture that are strung into sequences (“The school, / the road, / home”) while, occasionally, themselves turning upside down or even vanishing in part: “the .” Despite an unconventional presentation and dizzying twists, the tale ends up on a classic course. The delicious temptation to take an active role in the surreal adventure by adding details or even whole subplots will be hard to resist. (Picture book. 6-9)
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-59270-137-7
Page Count: 280
Publisher: Enchanted Lion Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2013
What a wag.
What do you get from sewing the head of a smart dog onto the body of a tough police officer? A new superhero from the incorrigible creator of Captain Underpants.
Finding a stack of old Dog Mancomics that got them in trouble back in first grade, George and Harold decide to craft a set of new(ish) adventures with (more or less) improved art and spelling. These begin with an origin tale (“A Hero Is Unleashed”), go on to a fiendish attempt to replace the chief of police with a “Robo Chief” and then a temporarily successful scheme to make everyone stupid by erasing all the words from every book (“Book ’Em, Dog Man”), and finish off with a sort of attempted alien invasion evocatively titled “Weenie Wars: The Franks Awaken.” In each, Dog Man squares off against baddies (including superinventor/archnemesis Petey the cat) and saves the day with a clever notion. With occasional pauses for Flip-O-Rama featurettes, the tales are all framed in brightly colored sequential panels with hand-lettered dialogue (“How do you feel, old friend?” “Ruff!”) and narrative. The figures are studiously diverse, with police officers of both genders on view and George, the chief, and several other members of the supporting cast colored in various shades of brown. Pilkey closes as customary with drawing exercises, plus a promise that the canine crusader will be further unleashed in a sequel.
What a wag. (Graphic fantasy. 7-9)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-58160-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Graphix/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
Readers will go for these pals who stick together in a bond as solid as stone.
More fun with Stick and Stone!
The BFFs whose exploits were chronicled in two earlier picture books (2015, 2021), illustrated by Tom Lichtenheld, have joined the graphic-novel universe. This second graphic novel starring the duo, after Stick and Stone Explore and More (2022), is divided into two chapters, each followed by appealing, simple activities. The first chapter finds the pals picnicking with friends near a cave. Timid worrywart Stone has misgivings, but those issues are resolved satisfactorily. Once over those hurdles, Stone confronts spelunking, a word he loves (as will readers) until he learns what it entails. Stone’s not into cave exploring, but what he discovers when he finds himself in a cave are unexpected—and not entirely unpleasant—surprises and, afterward, a burgeoning new friendship. In the second chapter, Stone effects a daring rescue as he extracts Stick from the jaws of an overly enthusiastic puppy, an adventure that leads the pair to adopt a “pet” that undergoes a spectacular transformation, necessitating a tender farewell. This charmer is chock-full of humor, heart, adventure, and the joys of friendship. Stick and Stone are endearingly winning characters with distinctive, expressive personalities. Kids will savor the dynamic, funny digital illustrations; follow the panels and speech bubbles easily; and appreciate the font, which varies with the narrative’s onomatopoeia.
Readers will go for these pals who stick together in a bond as solid as stone. (Graphic fiction. 6-9)Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-358-54938-3
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Clarion/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2023
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