Huck’s and Lobel collaborate again (Toads and Diamonds, 1996, etc.) in a retelling of a very old Scottish tale. Huck’s text is powerful and sweet, well-matched by Lobel’s theatrically imagined pictures. Three sisters plan their marriages, and the youngest, Peggy Ann, wishes only for a husband who is kind and good—even if he’s the Black Bull of Norroway. Naturally the Black Bull appears and takes her away, but he feeds her and chooses the easiest paths as he carries her on his back. They stop at three castles, owned by the Black Bull’s three brothers, and each gives Peggy Ann a gift to use when “your heart is like to break and then to break again.” When she takes a thorn from the bull’s foot, he’s restored to his true self as the Duke of Norroway, but only at night until he vanquishes the Guardian of the Glen. Peggy Ann is instructed to sit and wait for him without moving, but when she knows that he’s won, her excitement moves her to stand and this makes it impossible for him to locate her. Setting out to find him herself, Peggy Ann is faced with a glass mountain, seven years of apprenticeship, the witch who first placed the Duke under a spell, and the witch’s conniving daughter. In the end, she frees her beloved by perseverance and pluck—as well as the three treasures. The story’s provenance is carefully traced in an author’s note: though set in Norway, Peggy Ann’s black braids and references to food and certain physical features clearly set it in the Scots tradition. Lobel’s watercolor and ink illustrations are gorgeously rich in patterns: plaids and florals, watery swirls, and jagged peaks. Huck’s effort to find “traditional tales that show plucky girls” pays off here. (Picture book/folktale. 7-10)
Pub Date: April 30, 2001
ISBN: 0-688-16900-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2001
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
An uncomplicated opener, with some funny bits and a clear but not heavy agenda.
Hank Zipzer, poster boy for dyslexic middle graders everywhere, stars in a new prequel series highlighting second-grade trials and triumphs.
Hank’s hopes of playing Aqua Fly, a comic-book character, in the upcoming class play founder when, despite plenty of coaching and preparation, he freezes up during tryouts. He is not particularly comforted when his sympathetic teacher adds a nonspeaking role as a bookmark to the play just for him. Following the pattern laid down in his previous appearances as an older child, he gets plenty of help and support from understanding friends (including Ashley Wong, a new apartment-house neighbor). He even manages to turn lemons into lemonade with a quick bit of improv when Nick “the Tick” McKelty, the sneering classmate who took his preferred role, blanks on his lines during the performance. As the aforementioned bully not only chokes in the clutch and gets a demeaning nickname, but is fat, boastful and eats like a pig, the authors’ sensitivity is rather one-sided. Still, Hank has a winning way of bouncing back from adversity, and like the frequent black-and-white line-and-wash drawings, the typeface is designed with easy legibility in mind.
An uncomplicated opener, with some funny bits and a clear but not heavy agenda. (Fiction. 7-9)Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-448-48239-2
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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