Aye mateys, heave-ho with this bounty of pirate silliness.
Yo ho ho, it’s an alphabetical parade of pirates—by name!
These 26 cleverly illustrated and unexpected rhyming name choices are bound to tickle readers’ timbers. “Pirate ARTY. First to the party. // Pirate BRAD. Born to be bad.” Each pirate receives a full-page portrait that depicts him (they are all boys) engaged in the behavior described. Pirate Lee, who needs to pee, quivers outside the head, hands over his crotch. Pirate Quaid, who is not afraid, nevertheless looks a little dubious as giant octopus tentacles loom. Pirate Tony, who is fall of baloney, happily munches a sandwich. And so on. The illustrations of construction paper, charcoal and colored pencils have a collage effect with comic exaggeration. Silent, clothed frogs that add to the humor appear with the named pirates on every page, brawling, cheering, laughing and gasping as circumstances demand. The final two pages depict all 26 pirates together on a boat, allowing readers to revisit them all and guess who is who. Horowitz mined the same abecedarian vein in his Twenty-Six Princesses (2008), so it’s probably fitting that these pirates are all boys. Despite the lack of gender diversity, though, these little-boy buccaneers display a nice range of skin colors and hair textures.
Aye mateys, heave-ho with this bounty of pirate silliness. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: June 27, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-399-25777-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: April 2, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
A cheery story that “wool” likely evoke some smiles.
A “baa”-nd of pirates gets the wool pulled over their eyes.
After a treasure-hunting foray, Captain Hoof and his crew of fleecy sheep are homeward bound with a glittery bounty—the lost Golden Shears, which once belonged to the infamous Woolly Jones. Suddenly, huge waves engulf and smash their ship. They’re sheepwrecked and stranded on Foggy Island, home to none other than Woolly Jones. After nearly a month of failed attempts to get off the island, Captain Hoof decides to return the shears to their rightful owner. Trekking across the island through fog as thick and impenetrable as wool, captain and crew eventually bump into their nemesis, who snatches the shears from the captain’s hooves. Expecting dire consequences, everyone starts to flee, but things turn out wool, er, well. In a 90-degree book turn, Woolly is depicted using the shears to give himself a much-needed “woolcut.” He’s grateful for the shears—and for the company after a long, lonely spell. Captain Hoof and crew are delighted at this outcome. This is a cute tale, though the plot is a bit thin; the numerous, amusing sheep puns will appeal more to grown-ups than kids. But the digital illustrations are comical and dynamic, and the all-ovine protagonists are lively and expressive. The book contains lots of typographical creativity, including some onomatopoeic words, incorporated into the artwork, and maps in the endpapers include islands bearing funny, aptly punny names.
A cheery story that “wool” likely evoke some smiles. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: July 9, 2024
ISBN: 9780593569665
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
First of a tasty if not immediately nourishing new series.
When Dr. Bunsen, Gabe, Laura, and Cesar's mad-scientist neighbor, tries out his growth machine on Gabe's plastic animal toys, there's an unexpected result—they come to life.
Second-grade whiz kids Gabriel Martinez, Laura Reyes, and Cesar Moreno meet their strange neighbor while fundraising for a science-club field trip. Known to their classmates as “the Data Set,” they each have individual passions: Gabe loves animals; Laura loves to tinker and invent; Cesar loves to read and eat. There’s room for all these activities in their well-equipped treehouse. Together, their fantastic adventures will be the stuff of four titles scheduled for 2016 and aimed directly at first- and second-graders already devouring books. This episode introduces the characters, sets up the problem (the cute but rapidly growing baby animals), and finds a solution (sneak them into the zoo) in 126 fast-paced pages written with plenty of dialogue and copiously illustrated with appealing drawings. With these Latino protagonists—Cesar has dark skin and curly hair, while Laura and Gabe have lighter skin and straight hair—and a STEM-infused plot, this would seem to have been made to order for today’s elementary school students. While the emphasis is far more on plot than STEM, the kid-friendly fantasy should captivate readers, who will certainly want to gobble up the next installment. (Tantalizingly, the opening pages are included.)
First of a tasty if not immediately nourishing new series. (Adventure. 5-8)Pub Date: April 5, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4814-5729-3
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 8, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2016
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