The few giggles from the illustrations don’t make this more than a pork-barrel project.
An origin story for the Superpigs looks a lot like one many readers will be familiar with.
“Once upon a time, there were three little pigs. They dreamed of becoming SUPERHEROES! In fact,” readers are told, “they were so obsessed that their family house became cluttered with all of their superhero” paraphernalia. Evidently fed up with the mess, their mother sends them off into the world to find homes of their own, and after hours of travel, they arrive in Fairyland. Signs on trees warn of a wolf, and their new friend Little Red Riding Hood tells them stories of stolen sheep and stolen granny nighties. The pigs build their houses (you know the ones). Along comes the wolf and chinny-chin-chin rebuffs and huffing and puffing…it all leads to the inevitable two flat houses and one scalded, captured wolf. All of Fairyland declares them the “THREE LITTLE SUPERPIGS”—and the pigs get their wish. Evans’ unnecessary prequel to her cheeky, fractured original (2018) is a head-scratcher. Part of the charm of her first was that it picked up where the traditional tale left off. Why return to the source material with a rote retelling of the tale that a great many in her audience already know? Yes, this has a superhero twist, but that simply rehashes the first Superpig outing.
The few giggles from the illustrations don’t make this more than a pork-barrel project. (Picture book. 2-7)Pub Date: March 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-338-24548-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Nov. 20, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
So sweet it’ll have readers heading for their toothbrushes.
Another entry in the how-much-I-love-you genre.
The opening spread shows a blue elephant-and-child pair, the child atop the adult, white hearts arcing between their uplifted trunks: “You’re a gift and a blessing in every way. / I love you more each and every day.” From there, the adult elephant goes on to tell the child how they are loved more than all sorts of things, some rhyming better than others: “I love you more than all the spaghetti served in Rome, // and more than each and every dog loves her bone.” More than stars, fireflies, “all the languages spoken in the world,” “all the dancers that have ever twirled,” all the kisses ever given and miles ever driven, “all the adventures you have ahead,” and “all the peanut butter and jelly spread on bread!” Representative of all the world’s languages are “I love you” in several languages (with no pronunciation help): English, Sioux, French, German, Swahili, Spanish, Hawaiian, Chinese, and Arabic (these two last in Roman characters only). Bold colors and simple illustrations with no distracting details keep readers’ focus on the main ideas. Dashed lines give the artwork (and at least one word on every spread) the look of 2-D sewn toys.
So sweet it’ll have readers heading for their toothbrushes. (Picture book. 2-6)Pub Date: Dec. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4926-8398-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Parents of toddlers starting school or day care should seek separation-anxiety remedies elsewhere, and fans of the original...
A sweetened, condensed version of the best-selling picture book, The Kissing Hand.
As in the original, Chester Raccoon is nervous about attending Owl’s night school (raccoons are nocturnal). His mom kisses him on the paw and reminds him, “With a Kissing Hand… / We’ll never be apart.” The text boils the story down to its key elements, causing this version to feel rushed. Gone is the list of fun things Chester will get to do at school. Fans of the original may be disappointed that this board edition uses a different illustrator. Gibson’s work is equally sentimental, but her renderings are stiff and flat in comparison to the watercolors of Harper and Leak. Very young readers will probably not understand that Owl’s tree, filled with opossums, a squirrel, a chipmunk and others, is supposed to be a school.
Parents of toddlers starting school or day care should seek separation-anxiety remedies elsewhere, and fans of the original shouldn’t look to this version as replacement for their page-worn copies. (Board book. 2-4)Pub Date: April 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-933718-77-4
Page Count: 14
Publisher: Tanglewood Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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