Much-needed encouragement to look up and see the world!
Poo on you! Literally.
Fontaine the pigeon is fed up with screen-obsessed humans’ obliviousness to the world, so he convenes a meeting of the birds. Their unanimous decision: Drop poo on malefactors who glance down at their phones. “Targets” will be forced to look up after bombardment! Following the first “hit,” a mother quickly glances up, curious about “that bizarre scream,” because Fontaine has issued a battle cry—“VIVA LA REVOLUTION!” No screen remains untouched because, when someone glances down, “a glob of bird poop” knocks their phone to the ground. Finally, a child says, “I think these birds want us to give these phones a rest.” Everyone realizes they’ve forgotten nature, the importance of using their words—and each other. The moral: Thank the birds, and “when you are outside, keep your phone in your pocket…and your eyes up and wide.” Children will giggle at this tongue-in-cheek rhyming tale, set in New Orleans, and will hopefully get the point, which applies to adults, too: Screen time should be minimized and engaging with the world optimized. While the consequences outlined here are mined for exaggerated humor, this serious idea should spark conversations. The colorful, graphic novel–like illustrations are appealing and incorporate creative typefaces and speech bubbles; human characters are diverse.
Much-needed encouragement to look up and see the world! (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 30, 2024
ISBN: 9781223188089
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Paw Prints Publishing/Baker & Taylor
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2024
Perfect for those looking for a scary Halloween tale that won’t leave them with more fears than they started with. Pair with...
Reynolds and Brown have crafted a Halloween tale that balances a really spooky premise with the hilarity that accompanies any mention of underwear.
Jasper Rabbit needs new underwear. Plain White satisfies him until he spies them: “Creepy underwear! So creepy! So comfy! They were glorious.” The underwear of his dreams is a pair of radioactive-green briefs with a Frankenstein face on the front, the green color standing out all the more due to Brown’s choice to do the entire book in grayscale save for the underwear’s glowing green…and glow they do, as Jasper soon discovers. Despite his “I’m a big rabbit” assertion, that glow creeps him out, so he stuffs them in the hamper and dons Plain White. In the morning, though, he’s wearing green! He goes to increasing lengths to get rid of the glowing menace, but they don’t stay gone. It’s only when Jasper finally admits to himself that maybe he’s not such a big rabbit after all that he thinks of a clever solution to his fear of the dark. Brown’s illustrations keep the backgrounds and details simple so readers focus on Jasper’s every emotion, writ large on his expressive face. And careful observers will note that the underwear’s expression also changes, adding a bit more creep to the tale.
Perfect for those looking for a scary Halloween tale that won’t leave them with more fears than they started with. Pair with Dr. Seuss’ tale of animate, empty pants. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Aug. 22, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4424-0298-0
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
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