Abandoned by her father because she's not a boy, the infant princess Atalanta becomes the protege of the goddess Diana and is raised by a bear, learning to outdistance all the forest creatures. Returning (in the more familiar part of this Greek myth) to her father's court, she vows to marry only a man who is swifter than she is. In Martin's cleanly told version, Atalanta's love for Hippomenes is the reason she accepts the lure of Venus's apples, letting him win the race as she retrieves them. The Dillons provide an elegant setting: their formal borders and decorative vignettes have the aura and glow of stained glass; costumes, settings, and the patterns that adorn every page are a creative blend of the Greek, medieval, and purely imaginative. The animals are tactile-lovely; Atalanta herself is a pert gamine, a haughty princess—and a sturdy, Olympic-class runner. A handsome update of a grand story. (Mythology. 5+)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1991
ISBN: 0-8037-0248-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1991
Categories: CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S
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BOOK REVIEW
The seemingly ageless Seeger brings back his renowned giant for another go in a tuneful tale that, like the art, is a bit sketchy, but chockful of worthy messages. Faced with yearly floods and droughts since they’ve cut down all their trees, the townsfolk decide to build a dam—but the project is stymied by a boulder that is too huge to move. Call on Abiyoyo, suggests the granddaughter of the man with the magic wand, then just “Zoop Zoop” him away again. But the rock that Abiyoyo obligingly flings aside smashes the wand. How to avoid Abiyoyo’s destruction now? Sing the monster to sleep, then make it a peaceful, tree-planting member of the community, of course. Seeger sums it up in a postscript: “every community must learn to manage its giants.” Hays, who illustrated the original (1986), creates colorful, if unfinished-looking, scenes featuring a notably multicultural human cast and a towering Cubist fantasy of a giant. The song, based on a Xhosa lullaby, still has that hard-to-resist sing-along potential, and the themes of waging peace, collective action, and the benefits of sound ecological practices are presented in ways that children will both appreciate and enjoy. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-83271-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2001
Categories: CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S
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A child finds that being alone in a tiny tropical paradise has its ups and downs in this appealingly offbeat tale from the Australian author of Peeling the Onion (1999). Though her mother is long dead and her scientist father Jack has just sailed off on a quick expedition to gather plankton, Nim is anything but lonely on her small island home. Not only does she have constant companions in Selkie, a sea lion, and a marine iguana named Fred, but Chica, a green turtle, has just arrived for an annual egg-laying—and, through the solar-powered laptop, she has even made a new e-mail friend in famed adventure novelist Alex Rover. Then a string of mishaps darkens Nim’s sunny skies: her father loses rudder and dish antenna in a storm; a tourist ship that was involved in her mother’s death appears off the island’s reefs; and, running down a volcanic slope, Nim takes a nasty spill that leaves her feverish, with an infected knee. Though she lives halfway around the world and is in reality a decidedly unadventurous urbanite, Alex, short for “Alexandra,” sets off to the rescue, arriving in the midst of another storm that requires Nim and companions to rescue her. Once Jack brings his battered boat limping home, the stage is set for sunny days again. Plenty of comic, freely-sketched line drawings help to keep the tone light, and Nim, with her unusual associates and just-right mix of self-reliance and vulnerability, makes a character young readers won’t soon tire of. (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-375-81123-0
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2000
Categories: CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S
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