Creepy, kooky and deftly delivered, this dark story offers a bright ending for readers who might think they’ve just outgrown...
When the Queen died and her bereft king banished color from the kingdom, Prince Viridian’s world turned the gloomiest gray. A mysterious present (a cute, colorful creature called a wooglefoof) crashes his birthday party and changes all that, spiriting its garish stripes across the castle and sending the king’s Color Snatcher in fiendish, feverish pursuit.
Scratchy, black ink drawings deliver wobbly, warped perspectives over undulating gray backdrops, punctuated with pop-eyed expressions and swift action. The wooglefoof’s vivid fur clashes brilliantly with fine black linework and murky gray fog, propelling readers onward. Expert paneling unfailingly energizes and advances the story as well, creating a pace that leaves you panting. The sinister Color Snatcher’s jagged cheekbones, sharp nose and supremely str-e-etch-ed smile raises goosebumps, while the wooglefoof’s fluffy rainbow tail, googly eyes and spastic sprints deliver laughs. In Anderson’s giddily dark world, where Tim Burton or Edward Gorey might happily put up their feet, the comic and ridiculous teeter alongside the horrid and beastly. Sophisticated language and frightening chase scenes broaden this book’s appeal to older readers, who might start touting joyful flamboyance over ascetic boredom.
Creepy, kooky and deftly delivered, this dark story offers a bright ending for readers who might think they’ve just outgrown fairy tales. (Picture book. 5-10)Pub Date: Dec. 6, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-59643-357-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Neal Porter/Roaring Brook
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2011
Big fun for new readers who are ready to turn their Where’s Waldo skills to finding text.
It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s Big Bunny!
Controlled, repetitive text invites children to read short sentences directing them to find “a foot…a hand…a tail,” and so on. These named body parts belong to a figure that isn’t wholly visible until the book’s end, provoking readers to search them out in the detailed images. Their stark whiteness makes them stand out on the pages, which depict a busy, vibrant setting reminiscent of those in Richard Scarry books and are likewise populated by anthropomorphic animals going about their days. Shifting perspective and scale make it clear that the creature is not just another one of these animals, and many readers will use the title and cover image to infer that they belong to the eponymous Big Bunny. The reveal at the conclusion is that Big Bunny is not a giant but a large helium balloon of the sort seen in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. While this clever conceit is carried out with accessible text, there is a little quibble: the saturation and intentional busyness of the illustrations leaves little rest for new readers’ eyes. The sentences and vocabulary are simple, but finding them on the page is the challenge here.
Big fun for new readers who are ready to turn their Where’s Waldo skills to finding text. (Early reader. 5-7)Pub Date: Feb. 15, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8234-3458-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2015
A stunning and necessary historical picture book.
A Haitian grandmother and granddaughter share a holiday, a family recipe, and a story of freedom.
It’s New Year’s Day, and Belle and Ti Gran are sharing in the annual tradition of making Freedom Soup. Though Belle jokes that the dish is named because “It’s free,” Ti Gran informs her that it is anything but. What follows is a breathless recounting of family slave history before the Haitian rebellion, with Freedom Soup as the conduit between the historical past and present day. Charles’ prose and Alcántara’s illustrations work perfectly in tandem to re-create a Haiti that is heartbreakingly lush and tropical. The mellow brown of the main characters’ skin contrasts with the darkness of their slave ancestors’, and the vibrant blue waters and endless yellow sugarcane fields are both breathtaking and oppressive when viewed through this historical lens. One particularly affecting double-page spread uses the sweep of the fields to draw readers’ eyes up to the white slave-owning family, to whom the soup is served by a girl young enough to be Belle herself. This tale features characters for whom cooking is an elaborate dance as well as family bonding, and the soup looks so tempting readers will swear they smell it.
A stunning and necessary historical picture book. (Picture book. 5-9)Pub Date: Dec. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-7636-8977-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
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