This one serves as a gentle introduction to the concepts of day, night and the four seasons while celebrating and cementing...
A simple, joyful expression of love at all hours and through all seasons.
In short, rhyming verses, a doting parent professes love for his or her toddler all through the day and night: “I love you in the morning at the start of every day. // I love you in the evening when sunshine goes away. // I love you when the stars glow in the dim moonlight. // I love you in the silence that comes with every night.” In the verses that follow, the narrator continues in this vein, describing his or her love for the child in spring, summer, winter and fall, ending with: “Let’s watch the world together, in rain, or snow, or shine. // I love you always and forever, sweet child of mine.” The endearing, cartoon-style illustrations feature a blond, curly-haired Caucasian girl and her stuffed bunny sidekick in appealing yet uncluttered natural scenes, with the narrator/parent never pictured. Both the text—with brief lines that scan well and read smoothly—and the illustrations are well-suited to the toddler crowd.
This one serves as a gentle introduction to the concepts of day, night and the four seasons while celebrating and cementing the parent/child bond—if only it were more ethnically inclusive. (Board book. 6 mos.-3)Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-545-64771-7
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Cartwheel/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 28, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This delightful debut welcomes readers in like a house filled with love.
A 13-year-old biracial girl longs to build the house of her dreams.
For Lou Bulosan-Nelson, normal is her “gigantic extended family squished into Lola’s for every holiday imaginable.” She shares a bedroom with her Filipina mother, Minda—a former interior-design major and current nurse-to-be—in Lola Celina’s San Francisco home. From her deceased white father, Michael, Lou inherited “not-so-Filipino features,” his love for architecture, and some land. Lou’s quietude implies her keen eye for details, but her passion for creating with her hands resonates loudly. Pining for something to claim as her own, she plans to construct a house from the ground up. When her mom considers moving out of state for a potential job and Lou’s land is at risk of being auctioned off, Lou stays resilient, gathering support from both friends and family to make her dream a reality. Respicio authentically depicts the richness of Philippine culture, incorporating Filipino language, insights into Lou’s family history, and well-crafted descriptions of customs, such as the birdlike Tinikling dance and eating kamayan style (with one’s hands), throughout. Lou’s story gives voice to Filipino youth, addressing cultural differences, the importance of bayanihan (community), and the true meaning of home.
This delightful debut welcomes readers in like a house filled with love. (Fiction. 8-13)Pub Date: June 12, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5247-1794-0
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Wendy Lamb/Random
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2018
A wonderfully charming tale of family and sisters that anyone can bond with.
Two sisters who are constantly at odds take a family road trip that covers more ground—both literally and figuratively—than they expect.
After begging her parents for a sister, Raina gets more than she bargained for once Amara is born. From the moment she was brought home, Amara hasn’t been quite the cuddly playmate that Raina had hoped. As the years pass, the girls bicker constantly and apparently couldn’t be more unalike: Raina spends her time indoors underneath her headphones, and Amara loves animals and the outdoors. The girls, their mother and their little brother all pack up to drive to a family reunion, and it seems like the trip’s just going to be more of the same, with the girls incessantly picking on each other all the way from San Francisco to Colorado. However, when the trip doesn’t go quite as planned—for a number of reasons—the girls manage to find some common ground. Told in then-and-now narratives that are easily discernable in the graphic format, Telgemeier’s tale is laugh-out-loud funny (especially the story about the snake incident) and quietly serious all at once. Her rounded, buoyant art coupled with a masterful capacity for facial expressions complements the writing perfectly. Fans of her previous books Smile (2010) and Drama (2012) shouldn’t miss this one; it’s a winner.
A wonderfully charming tale of family and sisters that anyone can bond with. (Graphic memoir. 7-13)Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-545-54059-9
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Graphix/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2014
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