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MY HEAD HAS A BELLYACHE

Name: MY HEAD HAS A BELLYACHE
Author: Chris Harris
ISBN: 9780316592598

AND MORE NONSENSE FOR MISCHIEVOUS KIDS AND IMMATURE GROWN-UPS

From the Mischievous Nonsense series , Vol. 2

by Chris Harris ; illustrated by Andrea Tsurumi ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 18, 2023

Sidesplitting fun throughout for one or a crowd.

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A hefty gathering of versified reflections on topics from “dadding” to what the Nail-Clipping Fairy brings at night.

Pitched as the companion to I’m Just No Good at Rhyming (2017) but with artwork from Tsurumi rather than Lane Smith, Harris’ latest collection focuses on parenting, growing up, and like domestic themes. Along with parental revelations (“Secretly, we do the things we tell you not to do! / We leave our dirty clothes out, and we pick our noses, too”) and efforts to recall “My Very First Memory,” he explains that “The Place Where the Lost Things Go” is right here, extolls the virtues of “A Big, Comfy Chair and a Brand-New Book,” and gleefully reassures children that even in the dark they’re never all alone, because…“there are monsters!” Like Smith in the previous volume, Tsurumi plays a maverick role. In addition to a racially diverse cast of wide-eyed youngsters and grown-ups, they depict a set of animal critics regarding a villanelle with disgust and, in the wake of a warning on an early page, a meteor that plunges down later to annihilate an unfortunate poem. Though the adult perspectives and high page count make this a marathon run, protestations notwithstanding, the author is still just fine at rhyming, and that, not to mention his free-wheeling sense of humor, will keep young audiences reading all the way to the (rhymed!) glossary and into the goofy title and subject indexes.

Sidesplitting fun throughout for one or a crowd. (Poetry. 6-10)

Pub Date: July 18, 2023

ISBN: 9780316592598

Page Count: 192

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: April 11, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2023

Categories:

CHILDREN'S POETRY

- BOOK REVIEW
IF YOU LAUGH, I'M STARTING THIS BOOK OVER
by Chris Harris ; illustrated by Serge Bloch

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THE ALPHABET'S ALPHABET
by Chris Harris ; illustrated by Dan Santat

- BOOK REVIEW
I'M JUST NO GOOD AT RHYMING
by Chris Harris ; illustrated by Lane Smith

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ZILOT & OTHER IMPORTANT RHYMES

by Bob Odenkirk ; illustrated by Erin Odenkirk ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 10, 2023

A lackluster collection of verse enlivened by a few bright spots.

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Poems on various topics by the actor/screenwriter and his kids.

In collaboration with his now-grown children—particularly daughter Erin, who adds gently humorous vignettes and spot art to each entry—Bob Odenkirk, best known for his roles in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, dishes up a poetic hodgepodge that is notably loose jointed in the meter and rhyme departments. The story also too often veers from child-friendly subjects (bedtime-delaying tactics, sympathy for a dog with the zoomies) to writerly whines (“The be-all and end-all of perfection in scribbling, / no matter and no mind to any critical quibbling”). Some of the less-than-compelling lines describe how a “plane ride is an irony / with a strange and wondrous duplicity.” A few gems are buried in the bunch, however, like the comforting words offered to a bedroom monster and a frightened invisible friend, not to mention an invitation from little Willy Whimble, who lives in a tuna can but has a heart as “big as can be. / Come inside, / stay for dinner. / I’ll roast us a pea!” They’re hard to find, though. Notwithstanding nods to Calef Brown, Shel Silverstein, and other gifted wordsmiths in the acknowledgments, the wordplay in general is as artificial as much of the writing: “I scratched, then I scrutched / and skrappled away, / scritching my itch with great / pan-a-ché…” Human figures are light-skinned throughout.

A lackluster collection of verse enlivened by a few bright spots. (Poetry. 6-8)

Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2023

ISBN: 9780316438506

Page Count: 160

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: Aug. 12, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2023

Categories:

CHILDREN'S POETRY

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WHAT YOU NEED TO BE WARM

by Neil Gaiman ; illustrated by Various ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 31, 2023

No substitute for blankets or shelter, but perhaps a way of securing some warmth for those in need.

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Gaiman’s free-verse meditation on coming in from, or at least temporarily fending off, the cold is accompanied by artwork from 13 illustrators.

An ambassador for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the author put out a social media appeal in 2019 asking people about their memories of warmth; the result is this picture book, whose proceeds will go to the UNHCR. For many refugees and other displaced persons, Gaiman writes, “food and friends, / home, a bed, even a blanket, / become just memories.” Here he gathers images that signify warmth, from waking in a bed “burrowed beneath blankets / and comforters” to simply holding a baked potato or being offered a scarf. Using palettes limited to black and the warm orange in which most of the text is printed, an international slate of illustrators give these images visual form, and 12 of the 13 add comments about their intentions or responses. The war in Ukraine is on the minds of Pam Smy and Bagram Ibatoulline, while Majid Adin recalls his time as a refugee in France’s “Calais jungle” camp. “You have the right to be here,” the poet concludes, which may give some comfort to those facing the cold winds of public opinion in too many of the places where refugees fetch up. The characters depicted are diverse. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

No substitute for blankets or shelter, but perhaps a way of securing some warmth for those in need. (Picture book. 6-9)