A well-played serenade to the power of kindness and community.
Newly arrived in Delaware from Jamaica, Marley is determined to make new friends by performing an outdoor family concert for her neighbors.
The weather, however, has other plans. Marley’s parents and older sister seem ready for a rain check as a downpour drags on outside, but Marley and her two younger brothers, Axel and Zayne, won’t be dissuaded. “You can’t fix a problem until you look at it up close,” Marley tells her mother, then the three children don rain gear and head for the park. Having experienced tropical storms back in Jamaica, Marley decides that the concert can go on if many umbrellas are hung from the overhead stage lights. “Who has that many umbrellas?” Axel asks skeptically. Marley decides they will help their neighbors with their storm problems in exchange for umbrellas. The siblings cheerfully and determinedly rescue a cat, bail out a flooded basement, and pick produce in a greenhouse. The plan works well until they meet someone who needs all the umbrellas they have collected. There is a small moment of hesitation when Marley’s smile loses its sunniness, but she and her brothers head home empty-handed. The ending is both unsurprising and gratifying. The vibrant digital watercolor-and-crayon illustrations coupled with the communal focus of the text set a positive tone throughout. The joy of music is present in textual metaphors as well as visual representations of instruments and musical notes, even in the endpapers. Marley and her family are Black, while the neighbors have skin tones that range from pale to dark.
A well-played serenade to the power of kindness and community. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-30111-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
A friendship tale with solid messaging and plenty of fun sounds to share.
In this latest in the series, Little Blue Truck, driven by pal Toad, is challenged to a countryside race by Racer Red, a sleek, low-slung vehicle.
Blue agrees, and the race is on. Although the two start off “hood to hood / and wheel to wheel,” they switch positions often as they speed their way over dusty country roads. Blue’s farm friends follow along to share in the excitement and shout out encouragement; adult readers will have fun voicing the various animal sounds. Short rhyming verses on each page and several strategic page turns add drama to the narrative, but soft, mottled effects in the otherwise colorful illustrations keep the competition from becoming too intense. Racer Red crosses the finish line first, but Blue is a gracious loser, happy to have worked hard. That’s a new concept for Racer Red, who’s laser-focused on victory but takes Blue’s words (“win or lose, it’s fun to try!”) to heart—a revelation that may lead to worthwhile storytime discussions. When Blue’s farm animal friends hop into the truck for the ride home, Racer Red tags along and learns a second lesson, one about speed. “Fast is fun, / and slow is too, / as long as you’re / with friends.”
A friendship tale with solid messaging and plenty of fun sounds to share. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 25, 2025
ISBN: 9780063387843
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Jan. 18, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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