Monsters, big and small, can use a touch of empathy—so learns Phoebe when she finds a small shell and brings it to her mother. Her baby brother, Charlie, snatches it away and crunches it into shards. Dismayed, Phoebe rushes off to procure a new treasure, fashioning a magic wand from a stick and leaf. Home again, she finds Charlie seeking to make amends, but Phoebe dismisses him. Leaving him bereft, Phoebe is taken, courtesy of the magic wand, on a tour of a strange garden. There she meets a trio of monsters; gazing into their eyes, Phoebe sees their anguish: The fire monster is frightened, the swamp monster sad, the ice monster lonely. She returns to Charlie, dispels the creatures with her wand, and makes up with her brother. The story becomes potent with the implied correlation between Charlie and the monsters, in Phoebe's willingness to sense another's unhappiness through her anger, and the ambiguous ending. Jenkin-Pearce, known for more comic works, provides in her watercolors the right measures of fire and gentleness that the story demands. (Picture book. 6-9)
Pub Date: Nov. 15, 1997
ISBN: 0-09-176714-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Hutchinson/Trafalgar
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1997
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Sloat collaborates with Huffman, a Yu’pik storyteller, to infuse a traditional “origins” tale with the joy of creating. Hearing the old women of her village grumble that they have only tasteless crowberries for the fall feast’s akutaq—described as “Eskimo ice cream,” though the recipe at the end includes mixing in shredded fish and lard—young Anana carefully fashions three dolls, then sings and dances them to life. Away they bound, to cover the hills with cranberries, blueberries, and salmonberries. Sloat dresses her smiling figures in mixes of furs and brightly patterned garb, and sends them tumbling exuberantly through grassy tundra scenes as wildlife large and small gathers to look on. Despite obtrusively inserted pronunciations for Yu’pik words in the text, young readers will be captivated by the action, and by Anana’s infectious delight. (Picture book/folktale. 6-8)
Pub Date: June 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-88240-575-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2004
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Trickling, bubbling, swirling, rushing, a river flows down from its mountain beginnings, past peaceful country and bustling city on its way to the sea. Hooper (The Drop in My Drink, 1998, etc.) artfully evokes the water’s changing character as it transforms from “milky-cold / rattling-bold” to a wide, slow “sliding past mudflats / looping through marshes” to the end of its journey. Willey, best known for illustrating Geraldine McCaughrean’s spectacular folk-tale collections, contributes finely detailed scenes crafted in shimmering, intricate blues and greens, capturing mountain’s chill, the bucolic serenity of passing pastures, and a sense of mystery in the water’s shadowy depths. Though Hooper refers to “the cans and cartons / and bits of old wood” being swept along, there’s no direct conservation agenda here (for that, see Debby Atwell’s River, 1999), just appreciation for the river’s beauty and being. (Picture book/nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: June 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0792-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2000
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