A heartfelt expression of love in the face of grief.
A child learns to keep her late grandfather’s tradition alive.
Accompanied by her dog, young Mara grows up singing with her grandfather (Popi) and grandmother (Nene) every year for All Souls’ Day, a celebration of the departed. When Popi dies, Mara expects Nene to focus on him, not on the other deaths that still are remembered in their neighborhood. “Popi would want us to continue his tradition since others suffer, too,” Nene tells Mara. Mara tries to understand as they walk through the snow, from home to home, singing to neighbors. The child’s frustration mounts as they serenade families who have lost pets (“I love animals too, but what about Popi?”) and a father who lost his son in the war (“He died five years ago. Popi died this year”). “It is not for us to judge whose loss is the greatest,” Nene tells Mara. When Mara realizes that her grandmother’s effort is taking a toll, she goes off on her own, recruiting members of the community to come together and sing Popi’s song for Nene. Though tinged with melancholy, this story of the legacy that the departed leave the living is threaded with tenderness and hope. Swann relies on deeply saturated purple and blue hues, with airy swirls filled with musical notes expressing Popi’s song. Mara and her family are brown-skinned; their community is diverse.
A heartfelt expression of love in the face of grief. (information on All Souls’ Day) (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2024
ISBN: 9781506487519
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Beaming Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2024
This bunny escapes all the traps but fails to find a logical plot or an emotional connection with readers.
The bestselling series (How to Catch an Elf, 2016, etc.) about capturing mythical creatures continues with a story about various ways to catch the Easter Bunny as it makes its annual deliveries.
The bunny narrates its own story in rhyming text, beginning with an introduction at its office in a manufacturing facility that creates Easter eggs and candy. The rabbit then abruptly takes off on its delivery route with a tiny basket of eggs strapped to its back, immediately encountering a trap with carrots and a box propped up with a stick. The narrative focuses on how the Easter Bunny avoids increasingly complex traps set up to catch him with no explanation as to who has set the traps or why. These traps include an underground tunnel, a fluorescent dance floor with a hidden pit of carrots, a robot bunny, pirates on an island, and a cannon that shoots candy fish, as well as some sort of locked, hazardous site with radiation danger. Readers of previous books in the series will understand the premise, but others will be confused by the rabbit’s frenetic escapades. Cartoon-style illustrations have a 1960s vibe, with a slightly scary, bow-tied bunny with chartreuse eyes and a glowing palette of neon shades that shout for attention.
This bunny escapes all the traps but fails to find a logical plot or an emotional connection with readers. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4926-3817-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2017
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Not enough tricks to make this a treat.
Another holiday title (How To Catch the Easter Bunny by Adam Wallace, illustrated by Elkerton, 2017) sticks to the popular series’ formula.
Rhyming four-line verses describe seven intrepid trick-or-treaters’ efforts to capture the witch haunting their Halloween. Rhyming roadblocks with toolbox is an acceptable stretch, but too often too many words or syllables in the lines throw off the cadence. Children familiar with earlier titles will recognize the traps set by the costume-clad kids—a pulley and box snare, a “Tunnel of Tricks.” Eventually they accept her invitation to “floss, bump, and boogie,” concluding “the dance party had hit the finale at last, / each dancing monster started to cheer! / There’s no doubt about it, we have to admit: / This witch threw the party of the year!” The kids are diverse, and their costumes are fanciful rather than scary—a unicorn, a dragon, a scarecrow, a red-haired child in a lab coat and bow tie, a wizard, and two space creatures. The monsters, goblins, ghosts, and jack-o'-lanterns, backgrounded by a turquoise and purple night sky, are sufficiently eerie. Still, there isn’t enough originality here to entice any but the most ardent fans of Halloween or the series. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Not enough tricks to make this a treat. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-72821-035-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: May 10, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2022
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