This delightful story will appeal to everyone from younger preschoolers to new readers to dog lovers of any age.
An appealing black-and-white dog finds a home with a little girl and her parents after rescuing the child’s lost teddy bear.
A striking cover presents a simple, inviting image of the little dog with a quizzical expression. The story begins on the front endpapers with multiple spot illustrations of the dog looking sad and lonely. The dedication double-page–spread shows the dog observing a little girl and her mom leaving their house for a bike ride, with the child in her own little seat holding her teddy bear. Each page or spread has just two words of text, with a different adjective modifying the word “dog.” The pup’s struggles and emotions are ingeniously conveyed with this textual device, following the dog through danger, hunger, loneliness, and the brave restoration of the missing bear to the little girl. In a touching conclusion, the hopeful child asks her parents, “My dog?” Teddy bear, girl, and dog are ready to start their new life together on the last spread with a gigantic speech balloon stating, “Good dog.” The little girl has brown skin and black hair in cornrows, like her dad, and her mom has light skin. A busy scene at a city park shows a vibrant community with people of different ethnicities and ages, including several with disabilities. Digitally produced illustrations use a muted palette with smudgy edges and heavy, black outlines delineating the characters, complementing a thoughtful, well-paced design.
This delightful story will appeal to everyone from younger preschoolers to new readers to dog lovers of any age. (Picture book. 3-8)Pub Date: Aug. 7, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-266286-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: April 24, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2018
The story’s slight but allows kids to practice identifying and dealing with their own big feelings.
The diverse group of kids from All Are Welcome (2018) this time gathers in a vacant lot with tools in hand to clear the debris and make something new. But therein lies the rub: What should the something new be? While the exact nature of the disagreement is unfortunately not made clear to readers, the big feelings that the children exhibit are very clear (and for readers who need practice reading facial clues, there’s a labeled chart of 15 in the frontmatter). This book’s refrain is “How can I help? / What can we do?” And the answers, spread over several pages and not spelled out in so many words but rather shown in the illustrations, are: talk it through, compromise, and see things from another perspective. As a guide for dealing with feelings and problem-solving, the book is a bit slim and lacks a solid story to hook readers. But, as with its predecessor, its strength is again the diversity on display in its pages. There’s a rainbow of skin tones and hair colors as well as abundant variation in hair texture, several children exhibit visible disabilities, including one child who uses a wheelchair, and there are markers of religious and cultural diversity. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at 29.6% of actual size.)
The story’s slight but allows kids to practice identifying and dealing with their own big feelings. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: March 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-525-57974-8
Page Count: 42
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Dec. 24, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2021
From curds to riches, from meltdown to uplift—this multicourse romp delivers.
A winning wheel of cheddar with braggadocio to match narrates a tale of comeuppance and redemption.
From humble beginnings among kitchen curds living “quiet lives of pasteurization,” the Big Cheese longs to be the best and builds success and renown based on proven skills and dependable results: “I stuck to the things I was good at.” When newcomer Wedge moves to the village of Curds-on-Whey, the Cheese’s star status wobbles and falls. Turns out that quiet, modest Wedge is also multitalented. At the annual Cheese-cathlon, Wedge bests six-time winner Cheese in every event, from the footrace and chess to hat making and bread buttering. A disappointed Cheese throws a full-blown tantrum before arriving at a moment of truth: Self-calming, conscious breathing permits deep relief that losing—even badly—does not result in disaster. A debrief with Wedge “that wasn’t all about me” leads to further realizations: Losing builds empathy for others; obsession with winning obscures “the joy of participating.” The chastened cheddar learns to reserve bragging for lifting up friends, because anyone can be the Big Cheese. More didactic and less pun-rich than previous entries in the Food Group series, this outing nevertheless couples a cheerful refrain with pithy life lessons that hit home. Oswald’s detailed, comical illustrations continue to provide laughs, including a spot with Cheese onstage doing a “CHED” talk.
From curds to riches, from meltdown to uplift—this multicourse romp delivers. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2023
ISBN: 9780063329508
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
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