A perfect storm of bad art, worse design and trite content.
The spooky mansion “looks deserted” (windows aglow with lights in the picture notwithstanding), but a skeleton greets “you” at the door. He leads “you” on a tour past a jar of brains, a vampire’s “long box” (?), a monster’s soup tureen and other hollow items. These are all actually pockets, identically shaped but pasted on in different orientations. Outside each is an invitation to “slide your hand in if you dare… / See what’s lurking but BEWARE!” Inside, readers feel pieces of slick plastic, fur or other textured material meant to suggest an eyeball, fangs, spider legs or other must-avoids. In just recognition that these tactile clues are too poorly chosen and shaped to be even superficially credible, the narrative provides specific prompts. “Be so kind and fish out a fresh eyeball for me,” the monster politely asks “you”; readers will feel just a raised plastic button (though if they peer inside, they will see a plastic toy eye. Moreover, the low-budget illustrations are meant to be atmospheric but are actually only murky, blurred jumbles of cobwebby, candlelit antique bric-a-brac—capped by a notably unstartling glob of card-stock ectoplasm popping up in low relief from the final spread. A lackadaisical effort to exploit a gimmick used—and probably used up—to (somewhat) better effect in Steve Cox’s Is That You, Wolf? (2012). (Novelty/picture book. 5-7)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-7641-6641-9
Page Count: 22
Publisher: Barron's
Review Posted Online: Oct. 8, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2013
A high-spirited night free of frights.
Actor Plaza and writer/producer Murphy join forces for another bewitching picture book.
Halloween is always a dismal time for Pheenie the witch, because her parties are such failures—until the day spunky young Luna Lopez, who yearns to be a helpful bruja like her grandma in Puerto Rico, appears on her porch. The two strike a bargain: Pheenie will instruct Luna in spellcasting in return for Luna’s help planning and organizing a properly spook-tacular event. Luna helps Pheenie clean up the house and encourages her to substitute tasty cider for wormy trick-or-treat apples and to put out kid-friendly snacks like candy corn and cookies in place of the witch’s typical candied spiders and baked troll fingers. The effervescent narrative is further stoked by several rhymed spells and suitably energetic illustrations. Peck sets the tale in a racially diverse urban neighborhood, and as the witching hour approaches (at around eight p.m., according to the clock on the mantel), in troops a group of eager-looking young partygoers in upscale costumes to play hide-and-seek with real ghosts and dance to a goblin band. It’s a Halloween hullaballoo! Elderly Pheenie is pale-skinned; Luna is tan-skinned.
A high-spirited night free of frights. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: July 29, 2025
ISBN: 9780593693018
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Big fun for new readers who are ready to turn their Where’s Waldo skills to finding text.
It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s Big Bunny!
Controlled, repetitive text invites children to read short sentences directing them to find “a foot…a hand…a tail,” and so on. These named body parts belong to a figure that isn’t wholly visible until the book’s end, provoking readers to search them out in the detailed images. Their stark whiteness makes them stand out on the pages, which depict a busy, vibrant setting reminiscent of those in Richard Scarry books and are likewise populated by anthropomorphic animals going about their days. Shifting perspective and scale make it clear that the creature is not just another one of these animals, and many readers will use the title and cover image to infer that they belong to the eponymous Big Bunny. The reveal at the conclusion is that Big Bunny is not a giant but a large helium balloon of the sort seen in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. While this clever conceit is carried out with accessible text, there is a little quibble: the saturation and intentional busyness of the illustrations leaves little rest for new readers’ eyes. The sentences and vocabulary are simple, but finding them on the page is the challenge here.
Big fun for new readers who are ready to turn their Where’s Waldo skills to finding text. (Early reader. 5-7)Pub Date: Feb. 15, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8234-3458-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2015
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