Beatrice, whose own name is a bit of a L-U-L-U, is totally charming, and the story and artwork are a P-E-R-F-E-C-T M-A-T-C-H.
With email making the art of letter writing almost obsolete and texting turning spelling into truncated babble, this picture book is a clever and refreshing antidote.
Beatrice likes to make letters—not the mail kind, but the kind that form words—correctly. While she knows her alphabet and can write all the letters, her problem is putting them in the right order. Her grandma Nanny Hannah comes to her rescue and shows her a technique. Voilà, the more Beatrice spells (even words that are L-U-L-Us), the more she learns how words are put together. “That’s my spelling Bea,” says Nanny Hannah. Enthusiastic about her newly found skill, Beatrice launches a spelling campaign, correcting all the misspelled signs in town, but when she tries to start a spelling club, none of the kids are interested. That is, until her dictionary sparks an idea. The next day, when it’s her turn for show and tell, she changes the spelling on the blackboard to show and spell! Her report on her pet T-A-R-A-N-T-U-L-A and its T-E-R-R-A-R-I-U-M home is a huge hit, turning the whole class into spelling bugs. Potter’s quirky illustrations have just the right childlike quality to complement the text, cleverly incorporating amusing details. The ending neatly ties up the storyline with Beatrice writing a real letter, the kind that begins with “Dear Somebody.”
Beatrice, whose own name is a bit of a L-U-L-U, is totally charming, and the story and artwork are a P-E-R-F-E-C-T M-A-T-C-H. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Aug. 27, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-374-39904-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: July 2, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2013
Decidedly one-trick yet inspired and prettily designed.
Coppo adapts a 17th-century Italian magic trick for her latest meta excursion.
Tuxedoed Lady Rabbit welcomes her audience, acknowledging that wow-level magic is difficult to pull off in a book. Making something appear as if out of nowhere…well, “any book can do that!” But the titular claim bears out in cleverly designed pages. First, readers are told to scan a page of audience members (36 charmingly unique denizens arrayed in six rows) and to choose one member. Lady Rabbit then asks kids to identify the row of their seated pick by turning to a specific page. Uh-oh! Every audience member has changed seats! Again directed to a particular page based on their choice’s new row, readers will discover that Lady Rabbit has guessed their pick. All nine answer pages include the characters and the instruction: “I guessed it, didn’t I? Now go to page 39.” There, with a “TA-DA!” and a bow, the white rabbit invites kids to turn back to pages 12-13 to try again. Coppa’s finely inked floral borders and decorated proscenium arch, colored in black and white and muted greens and salmon, emanate a vintage feel. Kids will warm to amusing audience members such as Shroom, Yeti, and Unknown (a smiling question mark) and will delight in the various mini-creatures adorning each page. One downside of the trick’s interactivity: The six pages that redirect readers to the solution pages are visually identical.
Decidedly one-trick yet inspired and prettily designed. (historical note) (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: March 12, 2024
ISBN: 9781797229010
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Dec. 16, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2024
A solo debut for Wenzel showcasing both technical chops and a philosophical bent.
Wouldn’t the same housecat look very different to a dog and a mouse, a bee and a flea, a fox, a goldfish, or a skunk?
The differences are certainly vast in Wenzel’s often melodramatic scenes. Benign and strokable beneath the hand of a light-skinned child (visible only from the waist down), the brindled cat is transformed to an ugly, skinny slinker in a suspicious dog’s view. In a fox’s eyes it looks like delectably chubby prey but looms, a terrifying monster, over a cowering mouse. It seems a field of colored dots to a bee; jagged vibrations to an earthworm; a hairy thicket to a flea. “Yes,” runs the terse commentary’s refrain, “they all saw the cat.” Words in italics and in capital letters in nearly every line give said commentary a deliberate cadence and pacing: “The cat walked through the world, / with its whiskers, ears, and paws… // and the fish saw A CAT.” Along with inviting more reflective viewers to ruminate about perception and subjectivity, the cat’s perambulations offer elemental visual delights in the art’s extreme and sudden shifts in color, texture, and mood from one page or page turn to the next.
A solo debut for Wenzel showcasing both technical chops and a philosophical bent. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4521-5013-0
Page Count: 44
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
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