A droll episode, with any lesson or moral beyond, maybe, “try, try again” absent or well-buried.
Persistence pays off for an urban raccoon determined to upgrade his garbage-based diet.
Weary of scrounging “rotten junk” from rubbish bins and hearing that the animals in the nearby zoo get fresh food every day, Roscoe tries to sneak in: first disguised as a tortoise beneath a green umbrella, then as a penguin with a pointy ice cream cone for a beak. Unsurprisingly, neither silly disguise fools the surly zookeeper. Finally, at the monkeys’ invitation, he steals the zookeeper’s keys to join them in their cage—whereupon they leave him chowing down and scamper off to set all the animals free. Chaos ensues. Done in a retro style with flatly applied, low-contrast colors, the cartoon illustrations are well-stocked with active, comically expressive figures. The narrative’s poker-faced tone (“ ‘That’s not for pests like you!’ growled the zookeeper. He was not a good-tempered man”) adds a similarly antique flavor. The locale isn’t specified beyond “a park in the middle of a big city,” but some of the skyscrapers visible beyond the zoo’s low walls may look familiar to young New Yorkers. In any case, at day’s end Roscoe generously offers the last banana in the bucket to the frazzled zookeeper and saunters off with a belch.
A droll episode, with any lesson or moral beyond, maybe, “try, try again” absent or well-buried. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: June 9, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-909263-53-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Flying Eye Books
Review Posted Online: March 31, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2015
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Totes adorbs.
A cuddly, squishy pug’s puggy-wuggy diary.
Equipped with both #pugunicorn and #pughotdog outfits, pug Baron von Bubbles (aka Bub) is the kind of dog that always dresses to impress. Bub also makes lots of memorable faces, such as the “Hey, you’re not the boss of me!” expression aimed at Duchess, the snooty pink house cat. Some of Bub’s favorite things include skateboarding, a favorite teddy, and eating peanut butter. Bub also loves Bella, who adopted Bub from a fair—it was “love at first sniff.” Together, Bub and Bella do a lot of arts and crafts. Their latest project: entering Bella’s school’s inventor challenge by making a super-duper awesome rocket. But, when the pesky neighborhood squirrel, Nutz, makes off with Bub’s bear, Bub accidentally ruins their project. How will they win the contest? More importantly, how will Bella ever forgive him? May’s cutesy, full-color cartoon art sets the tone for this pug-tastic romp for the new-to–chapter-books crowd. Emojilike faces accentuate Bub’s already expressive character design. Bub’s infectious first-person narration pushes the silly factor off the charts. In addition to creating the look and feel of a diary, the lined paper helps readers follow the eight-chapter story. Most pages have fewer than five sentences, often broken into smaller sections. Additional text appears in color-coded speech bubbles. Bella presents white.
Totes adorbs. (Fiction. 5-7)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-338-53003-2
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2019
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