A positive and fun-filled challenge to recognize and apply the underlying principles of science in everyday life.
Furry-tailed but not furry-headed, brother and sister Newton and Curie set out to conquer their world with science.
A nearby school for humans provides all the impetus needed to discover what makes everything work. From comprehending the amazing combo of force, mass, and gravity required for playground swings to the secrets of seesaws and pulleys, the intrepid experimenters can’t get enough. They test ideas using trial and error to refine their science projects. The children’s teacher, a woman of color, introduces diagrams of simple machines to a diverse group of grade school children. The information is not lost on the spying squirrel siblings, who apply the principles to return a fallen nest of four (miraculously intact) robins’ eggs to their relieved parents’ tree. How do birds defy gravity when flying? Newton and Currie can’t wait to find out! Kirk’s simple STEAM-driven text seamlessly leads readers from one tenet of physics to another as it’s applied to common objects. Kirk’s use of the schoolroom whiteboard to educate the squirrels is a clever visual aid. The anthropomorphic characters’ clothing reflects the casual dress of the students, and the bright palette is a perfect attention-getter for the story’s targeted audience. Repeated images of simple machines cover the endpapers, and the backmatter includes an introduction to some basic laws of physics, a detailed glossary, and links to science websites. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10.5-by-17-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
A positive and fun-filled challenge to recognize and apply the underlying principles of science in everyday life. (Picture book. 5-9)Pub Date: Aug. 11, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3748-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This outing lacks the sophistication of such category standards as Clementine; here’s hoping English amps things up for...
A gentle voice and familiar pitfalls characterize this tale of a boy navigating the risky road to responsibility.
Gavin is new to his neighborhood and Carver Elementary. He likes his new friend, Richard, and has a typically contentious relationship with his older sister, Danielle. When Gavin’s desire to impress Richard sets off a disastrous chain of events, the boy struggles to evade responsibility for his actions. “After all, it isn’t his fault that Danielle’s snow globe got broken. Sure, he shouldn’t have been in her room—but then, she shouldn’t be keeping candy in her room to tempt him. Anybody would be tempted. Anybody!” opines Gavin once he learns the punishment for his crime. While Gavin has a charming Everyboy quality, and his aversion to Aunt Myrtle’s yapping little dog rings true, little about Gavin distinguishes him from other trouble-prone protagonists. He is, regrettably, forgettable. Coretta Scott King Honor winner English (Francie, 1999) is a teacher whose storytelling usually benefits from her day job. Unfortunately, the pizzazz of classroom chaos is largely absent from this series opener.
This outing lacks the sophistication of such category standards as Clementine; here’s hoping English amps things up for subsequent volumes. (Fiction. 6-9)Pub Date: Dec. 17, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-547-97044-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A charming friendship story and great setup for future books.
Curious about the Big Wide World outside his Sasquatch community, Hugo makes a friend who is of it.
Sasquatch Hugo’s bedroom is inside a cave and possesses the charming feature of a small stream running through it that he can sail his little toy boat on. It’s cool, but he yearns to see the Big Wide World. When he asks his smart friend Gigi if a Sasquatch might become a sailor, she says it’s possible but would be difficult—the primary rule of their people is to not be seen by Humans. Then, in everyone’s favorite Hide and Go Sneak class, which is held outside, a Human appears; Hugo laughs at the sight, drawing Human attention in a taboo-breaking mistake. Shortly after, Hugo’s toy boat floats into the cave with a Human toy—soon, it’s facilitating a pen-pal–type relationship that’s derailed when Hugo confesses to being a Sasquatch and Human Boone, a budding cryptozoologist, doesn’t believe him. How Hugo and Boone resolve this misapprehension and become friends in a joint search for the Ogopogo concludes this series opener. Potter keeps the third-person narrative tightly focused on Hugo’s perspective, and the details she uses to flesh out the Sasquatch world are delightfully playful. Sala’s drawings depict a homey Sasquatch cavern community, Boone as a freckled, white boy, and Hugo as a hairily benevolent behemoth.
A charming friendship story and great setup for future books. (final art unseen) (Fantasy. 5-9)Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4197-2859-4
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2018
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