In their sixth adventure together, best friends Bear and Mouse celebrate Christmas with pickles, a poem, and presents.
Bear invites Mouse to their first-ever Christmas party, although Bear knows only what he’s read about how Christmas is celebrated. He announces that eating pickles and “reading a long and difficult poem” (“A Visit from St. Nicholas”) should be enough for their party, but Mouse is most interested in the possibility of presents. Grumpy Bear pretends to reject the notion: “Monstrous assumption!” Ever hopeful, Mouse repeatedly escapes from Bear to search the house for gifts, finally locating his Christmas stocking with a tiny telescope tucked inside. Taking the telescope outside to view the night sky leads to a search for Bear’s present, a huge sled that Mouse has somehow hidden under a snow-covered tree. In a satisfying conclusion, Bear and Mouse gleefully sled down a hill “under the shining stars of Christmas.” Bear’s curmudgeonly personality and Mouse’s cheerful antics provide droll humor conveyed with polished comedic pacing and clever phrases such as “a mournful bite of pickle.” Soft-focus illustrations in watercolor, ink, and gouache are particularly strong in the subtle expressions on the animal faces as well as in meeting the design challenge of including a huge bear and a tiny mouse in one environment.
Another appealing adventure for this delightful duo, just right for a Christmas Eve storytime, perhaps enjoyed with a plate of pickles. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: Sept. 19, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-7636-4923-4
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2017
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S HOLIDAYS & CELEBRATIONS
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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
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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The bestselling series (How to Catch an Elf, 2016, etc.) about capturing mythical creatures continues with a story about various ways to catch the Easter Bunny as it makes its annual deliveries.
The bunny narrates its own story in rhyming text, beginning with an introduction at its office in a manufacturing facility that creates Easter eggs and candy. The rabbit then abruptly takes off on its delivery route with a tiny basket of eggs strapped to its back, immediately encountering a trap with carrots and a box propped up with a stick. The narrative focuses on how the Easter Bunny avoids increasingly complex traps set up to catch him with no explanation as to who has set the traps or why. These traps include an underground tunnel, a fluorescent dance floor with a hidden pit of carrots, a robot bunny, pirates on an island, and a cannon that shoots candy fish, as well as some sort of locked, hazardous site with radiation danger. Readers of previous books in the series will understand the premise, but others will be confused by the rabbit’s frenetic escapades. Cartoon-style illustrations have a 1960s vibe, with a slightly scary, bow-tied bunny with chartreuse eyes and a glowing palette of neon shades that shout for attention.
This bunny escapes all the traps but fails to find a logical plot or an emotional connection with readers. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4926-3817-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2017
Categories: CHILDREN'S HOLIDAYS & CELEBRATIONS
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