by Buffy Silverman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 3, 2023
Breathtaking images and lively text.
Close-up, detailed photographs of animals and winter scenes accompany simple rhyming text.
This simple nonfiction picture book provides readers with high-definition images that showcase the delicate beauty of individual snowflakes and a mouse’s tiny whiskers and tufts of fur. While the concise, bouncy text keeps the pages turning, it’s really the stunning photography that pulls readers in. More than just the furry creatures impress; a show-stopping image of shadows cast by winter trees is pure barren beauty. All the animals are shown in their winter habitat and include some surprises such as a huddled bunch of bees keeping warm and a pile of beetles against white snow. Readers will surely expect the owl and bears, but the grouse, nymph, and heron are surprising inclusions. The rhyming text is largely simple two-word sentences describing each image, introducing young readers to vocabulary such as glistens, prowl, and lumbers. The final pages include a paragraph of description about many of the featured animals, along with suggested further reading and a glossary. Ultimately, the incredible photography makes this book worthy of a spot on readers’ shelves, but the rhyming text and end notes certainly bolster its value.
Breathtaking images and lively text. (further reading, glossary) (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2023
ISBN: 9798765605028
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Millbrook/Lerner
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2023
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by Alice Schertle ; illustrated by Jill McElmurry ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 23, 2014
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own...
The sturdy Little Blue Truck is back for his third adventure, this time delivering Christmas trees to his band of animal pals.
The truck is decked out for the season with a Christmas wreath that suggests a nose between headlights acting as eyeballs. Little Blue loads up with trees at Toad’s Trees, where five trees are marked with numbered tags. These five trees are counted and arithmetically manipulated in various ways throughout the rhyming story as they are dropped off one by one to Little Blue’s friends. The final tree is reserved for the truck’s own use at his garage home, where he is welcomed back by the tree salestoad in a neatly circular fashion. The last tree is already decorated, and Little Blue gets a surprise along with readers, as tiny lights embedded in the illustrations sparkle for a few seconds when the last page is turned. Though it’s a gimmick, it’s a pleasant surprise, and it fits with the retro atmosphere of the snowy country scenes. The short, rhyming text is accented with colored highlights, red for the animal sounds and bright green for the numerical words in the Christmas-tree countdown.
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own tree that will put a twinkle in a toddler’s eyes. (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-544-32041-3
Page Count: 24
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2014
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by Alice Schertle ; illustrated by John Joseph
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by Christopher Silas Neal ; illustrated by Christopher Silas Neal ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 27, 2018
Innovative and thoroughly enjoyable.
You think you know shapes? Animals? Blend them together, and you might see them both a little differently!
What a mischievous twist on a concept book! With wordplay and a few groan-inducing puns, Neal creates connections among animals and shapes that are both unexpected and so seemingly obvious that readers might wonder why they didn’t see them all along. Of course, a “lazy turtle” meeting an oval would create the side-splitting combo of a “SLOW-VAL.” A dramatic page turn transforms a deeply saturated, clean-lined green oval by superimposing a head and turtle shell atop, with watery blue ripples completing the illusion. Minimal backgrounds and sketchy, impressionistic detailing keep the focus right on the zany animals. Beginning with simple shapes, the geometric forms become more complicated as the book advances, taking readers from a “soaring bird” that meets a triangle to become a “FLY-ANGLE” to a “sleepy lion” nonagon “YAWN-AGON.” Its companion text, Animal Colors, delves into color theory, this time creating entirely hybrid animals, such as the “GREEN WHION” with maned head and whale’s tail made from a “blue whale and a yellow lion.” It’s a compelling way to visualize color mixing, and like Animal Shapes, it’s got verve. Who doesn’t want to shout out that a yellow kangaroo/green moose blend is a “CHARTREUSE KANGAMOOSE”?
Innovative and thoroughly enjoyable. (Board book. 2-4)Pub Date: March 27, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4998-0534-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Little Bee Books
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
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by Kate Messner ; illustrated by Christopher Silas Neal
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by Sneed B. Collard III ; illustrated by Christopher Silas Neal
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by Jody Jensen Shaffer ; illustrated by Christopher Silas Neal
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