“Tiger was born fluffy and small, with his eyes tight shut.” So begins this lovely, lyrical fable about the tiger, “lord of the forest,” who doesn’t discover his majestic title until he grows up. Tiger is extraordinarily sensitive to the murmurings of his surroundings; he hears the slither of zig-zagged snakes, the curling of the chameleon’s tongue, and the creeps of crabs. His mother tells him that when the forest goes silent and time stands still, he will know that “The Lord of the Forest is here!” When he asks who this Lord is, the peacock, the rhinoceros, and the elephant all boastfully claim the title, but Tiger knows these screeching, bellowing, roaring beasts could never be the great one his mother has prepared him to meet. It’s not until he has a family of his own that his tigress mate tells him he’s the lord of the forest. Morris’s beautiful, often full-bleed watercolors of non-anthropomorphized animals in their natural habitat further distinguish this quiet story about grace, humility, and identity. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2004
ISBN: 1-84507-058-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Frances Lincoln
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2004
The wriggly narrator of Diary of a Worm (2003) puts in occasional appearances, but it’s his arachnid buddy who takes center stage here, with terse, tongue-in-cheek comments on his likes (his close friend Fly, Charlotte’s Web), his dislikes (vacuums, people with big feet), nervous encounters with a huge Daddy Longlegs, his extended family—which includes a Grandpa more than willing to share hard-won wisdom (The secret to a long, happy life: “Never fall asleep in a shoe.”)—and mishaps both at spider school and on the human playground. Bliss endows his garden-dwellers with faces and the odd hat or other accessory, and creates cozy webs or burrows colorfully decorated with corks, scraps, plastic toys and other human detritus. Spider closes with the notion that we could all get along, “just like me and Fly,” if we but got to know one another. Once again, brilliantly hilarious. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-06-000153-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Joanna Cotler/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2005
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
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