A comforting cadence of promises well suited to bedtime reading.
Murphy’s picture book of questions and answers reinforces the no-matter-what promise of a caregiver’s love.
Toddler Lee, who has fair skin and brown hair, asks their mother, “How much do you love me?” The mother promises that she loves Lee “as much as all of the leaves on all of the trees, in all of the forests.” But what if the leaves fall, Lee wonders? The mother responds with further promises, each one based on nature, as Lee asks what-if questions meant to stump their parent. Lee’s mother never gets stuck, though—she pivots each time, describing another natural wonder, until finally she says that even if all of nature vanished, she would still love Lee that much—and Lee agrees that they love their mother that much, too. The author uses the same repeated phrases, but the subtle context changes—from a certainty to a what-if and then back to a promise—make each use feel fresh. The continued use of similar phrasing makes this a perfect read-aloud choice for toddlers, especially those who constantly ask what-if questions, who can chime in on each occurrence. Murphy’s full-color digital art is also repeated, in concert with the text; while in some books that sort of reuse feels lazy, here it effectively reiterates the theme and the depth of the mother’s love.
A comforting cadence of promises well suited to bedtime reading.Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2023
ISBN: 9798376438992
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: May 12, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Relatable guidance for nocturnal worriers.
Actor and author Greenfield’s latest picture book follows a child kept awake by anxieties.
The pajama-clad narrator huddles in bed among the blue shadows of a bedroom at night. “Every time I close my eyes, I’m afraid of all the scary stuff I see.” Bright, candy-hued clouds of cartoon images surround the child, lively, disruptive depictions of the what-ifs and exaggerated disasters that crowd out sleep: war (we see the world pop “into a piece of popcorn”), kidnapping (pirates carry away the child’s teddy bear), falling “up” into the sun, tarantulas in the toilet, and a menacing-looking dentist. These outsize insomnia inducers may help readers put their own unvoiced concerns into perspective; after all, what frightens one person might seem silly but understandable to another. Our narrator tries to replace the unsettling thoughts with happy ones—hugging a baby panda, being serenaded by a choir of doughnuts, and “all the people who love me holding hands and wearing every piece of clothing that they own.” But sleep is still elusive. Finally, remembering that there’s a difference between reality and an overactive imagination, the child relaxes a bit: “Right now, everything is okay. And so am I.” Reassuring, though not exactly sedate, this tale will spark daytime discussions about how difficult it can be to quiet unsettling thoughts. The child has dark hair and blue-tinged skin, reflecting the darkness of the bedroom.
Relatable guidance for nocturnal worriers. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2024
ISBN: 9780593697894
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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