Disappointing.
Four cohabiting friends take a journey to escape 100 days of rain.
The gentle creatures dress, act, and talk like kind, friendly people—and sport antlers and vaguely mouselike silhouettes. Their light-brown, white-freckled faces blend harmoniously with the muted, dreamlike landscapes. The plot is episodic; after the smallest friend, Minnie, has “the most fabulous idea in her whole life,” the friends go through a variety of adventures as they pursue a sunny picnic on top of the Blue Mountain. They initially ride horses that resemble unicorns, after which they use tools to turn a shipwrecked pirate ship into a veritable ark, collecting animals as they go. The story is long and tedious, crowded with hyperbolic words, exclamation points, and breathlessly patronizing expressions such as “Oh my” and “Oh yes.” The whimsical illustrations cannot save the verbose text. Reading the story is further complicated by the 19 interspersed sets of song lyrics from the accompanying CD. The CD includes a male voice reading the story along with mostly original ditties incorporating various styles of world music, including instruments plus several different, pleasant voices, into short, often hypnotic, songs. Single song tracks can be useful for encouraging movement or naptime with little ones; playing the text-plus-songs or reading the book aloud is unlikely to keep a child engrossed. Ironically, some of the best writing is in the lyrics.
Disappointing. (Picture book/music. 4-6)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2021
ISBN: 978-2-925108-69-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: The Secret Mountain
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2021
The book’s simplicity guarantees achievement for beginning readers.
Two kids, probably siblings, explore their surrounding world through magnification.
While the older one remains inside with a microscope, the younger prefers the outside, examining all with a large hand-held magnifying glass. “I see,” the kid declares, focusing on several insects and animals while peering through the glass. A large, blue-black ant grins up through the glass as the child states, “I see an ant.” A butterfly, a snail, and robins’ eggs similarly appear through the glass, all narrated in the short, patterned text. Arriving home with discoveries crawling and flapping behind, the explorer now declares, “We see,” to the older child. The minimalist text is perfect for emerging readers, allowing children the ability to successfully read a whole book. Each repetitive sentence with its additional new word is coupled with recognizable picture cues to help in decoding. Cepeda’s characteristically energetic artwork offers sharp-edged, jagged lines that give it a scratch-art look. The siblings are dressed nearly identically, in blue shorts and red polo shirts, and they have tousled brown hair, beige skin, and big smiles.
The book’s simplicity guarantees achievement for beginning readers. (Picture book/early reader. 4-6)Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-8234-4504-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2019
Unrealistic in several ways but good at least for sniggers, this follow-up to Bear in Underwear (2010) features plenty of views of Bear on the soccer pitch clad in nothing below the waist but undies. The tighty whities of the previous episode give way to dinky pinkies after Bear washes them with his red jersey, but since they’re his lucky underwear he bears the continuing mockery of the opposing squad—“You look like a girl!” “You stink and your shorts are pink!” etc.—to score the winning goal. Not only do the losers change their opinion (“Wow, pink’s alright!”), but Bear’s own team members all don pink BVDs in solidarity: “Pink isn’t yucky! It’s super cool and super lucky!” While there is some charm to the notion of a soccer team that includes a beaver, a hedgehog and Big Foot, it isn't enough to sustain a whole lot of investment on the part of young readers. Logically minded children will wonder why Bear’s lucky (and still-white—this is before the laundry tragedy) undies are the only things gleaming white as Bear and his teammates stand, "covered in mud, including Bear and his lucky underwear." A sliding panel on the front cover that drops Bear’s shorts with the pull of a tab is the high (low) point of this dismal one-joker. (Picture book. 4-6)
Pub Date: April 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-60905-077-1
Page Count: 36
Publisher: Blue Apple
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2011
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