BAD BYE, GOOD BYE

Name: BAD BYE, GOOD BYE
Author: Deborah Underwood
ISBN: 978-0-547-92852-4

by Deborah Underwood ; illustrated by Jonathan Bean ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 2014

This is a useful depiction of a family’s physical move, but the strength is in the emotional journey that’s expressed with a...

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Underwood explores the range of emotions a child moving to a new place may feel with a spare, rhyming text that creates a framework for Bean’s evocative illustrations.

An overbearing gray pall pulls readers into a young boy’s world of frustration, anger and hurt over moving. Pencil drawings with graphically stylized flat areas of color give detail to the four words of text per spread. “Bad mop / Bad blocks // Bad truck / Bad guy” (this last is the man loading the family’s belongings into the van). A car chugs through a changing landscape as the boy throws a tantrum, sleeps, brightens and hesitates. Bean effectively layers tones and imagery to depict the passage of time and bring forth the immediacy of a situation. As the boy enters his new house at night, there’s sensory overload, with light, shadows and the unfamiliar, creating an unsettling feel. But all ends well when a new acquaintance becomes a friend. Not every family or child may experience such negative emotions, but Underwood and Bean offer a potential tool for teaching empathy toward others who have made such a transition.

This is a useful depiction of a family’s physical move, but the strength is in the emotional journey that’s expressed with a raw honesty. (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: April 1, 2014

ISBN: 978-0-547-92852-4

Page Count: 32

Publisher: HMH Books

Review Posted Online: Feb. 18, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2014

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

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TINY GARDEN
by Deborah Underwood ; illustrated by Jax Chow

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THE FAIRY TALE FIXERS
by Deborah Underwood ; illustrated by Jorge Lacera ; color by Jorge Lacera & Megan Lacera

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THE MAN WHO DIDN'T LIKE ANIMALS
by Deborah Underwood ; illustrated by LeUyen Pham

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BEST BUNNY BROTHER EVER

by Marilyn Sadler ; illustrated by Tim Bowers ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 6, 2026

A tale of mutual adoration that hits a sweet note.

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Little Honey Bunny Funnybunny loves baseball almost as much as she loves her big brother P.J.—though it’s a close-run thing.

Readers familiar with the pranks P.J. plays on his younger sibling in older episodes of the series (most illustrated by Roger Bollen) will be amused—and perhaps a little confused—to see him in the role of perfect big brother after meeting his swaddled little sister for the first time in mama’s lap. But here, along with being a constant companion and “always happy to see her,” he cements his heroic status in her eyes by hitting a home run for his baseball team and then patiently teaching her how to play T-ball. After carefully coaching her and leading her through warm-up exercises, he even sits in the stands, loudly cheering her on as she scores the winning run in her own very first game. “‘You are the best brother a bunny could ever have!’” she burbles. This tale’s a tad blander compared with others centered on P.J. and his sister, but it’s undeniably cheery, with text well structured for burgeoning readers. The all-smiles animal cast in Bowers’ cartoon art features a large and diversely hued family of bunnies sporting immense floppy ears as well as a multispecies crowd of furry onlookers equally varied of color, with one spectator in a wheelchair.

A tale of mutual adoration that hits a sweet note. (Early reader. 6-8)

Pub Date: Jan. 6, 2026

ISBN: 9798217032464

Page Count: 48

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: March 17, 2026

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2026

Categories:

CHILDREN'S FAMILY | CHILDREN'S ANIMALS

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IT'S NOT EASY BEING A GHOST
by Marilyn Sadler ; illustrated by Stephanie Laberis

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IT'S NOT EASY BEING SANTA CLAUS
by Marilyn Sadler ; illustrated by Stephanie Laberis

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CHARLIE PIECHART AND THE CASE OF THE MISSING PIZZA SLICE
by Eric Comstock & Marilyn Sadler ; illustrated by Eric Comstock

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)