“Hazy heat, / sweaty brow. / Dusty field, / tractor plow. / Dark horizon, / speckled sky. / Cornstalks rustle, / blackbirds fly.” A summer storm interrupts the chores of two farm boys on the plains of Ohio; the red-wing black birds fly up out of the corn. The sky darkens; the first lightning strikes in the distance. The boys and their father run for the barn as first rain and then hail pelts the fields. The sky clears, the black birds return and a rainbow appears above the farm. Thanks to the quenching rain, they can look forward to a good harvest coming soon. Mortensen’s pleasant rhymed verse nicely captures the short, sudden storm. Kiesler’s full-bleed expressionistic paintings have the wide open feel of the Ohio countryside. A nice snapshot of modern rural life, this will be a great addition to storytimes on weather and farms. (Picture book. 3-8)
Pub Date: May 15, 2006
ISBN: 0-618-59542-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2006
“It’s time to head back home,” the narrator concludes. “You’ve touched the Earth in so many ways.” Who knew it would be so...
A pro bono Twinkie of a book invites readers to fly off in a magic plane to bring clean water to our planet’s oceans, deserts, and brown children.
Following a confusingly phrased suggestion beneath a soft-focus world map to “touch the Earth. Now touch where you live,” a shake of the volume transforms it into a plane with eyes and feathered wings that flies with the press of a flat, gray “button” painted onto the page. Pressing like buttons along the journey releases a gush of fresh water from the ground—and later, illogically, provides a filtration device that changes water “from yucky to clean”—for thirsty groups of smiling, brown-skinned people. At other stops, a tap on the button will “help irrigate the desert,” and touching floating bottles and other debris in the ocean supposedly makes it all disappear so the fish can return. The 20 children Coh places on a globe toward the end are varied of skin tone, but three of the four young saviors she plants in the flier’s cockpit as audience stand-ins are white. The closing poem isn’t so openly parochial, though it seldom rises above vague feel-good sentiments: “Love the Earth, the moon and sun. / All the children can be one.”
“It’s time to head back home,” the narrator concludes. “You’ve touched the Earth in so many ways.” Who knew it would be so easy to clean the place up and give everyone a drink? (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: April 11, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5107-2083-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sky Pony Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 3, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
Lichtenheld takes a charming turn with the "tiny but mighty" theme. Cloudette usually enjoys being small—she can cavort with birds and kites, and hide between skyscrapers. But she’s wistful when other clouds do big things, like create cold fronts and water crops. Her imagination yields lots of wishes, depicted in ink-and-watercolor spot illustrations. “[S]he thought nothing would be more fun than giving some kids a day off from school,” accompanies a snowscape with banks billowing up to the windows of the school and buses clearly going nowhere. No one seems to need a little cloud, but when she’s blown clear out of her neighborhood, she’s welcomed by new friends—an eagle, a bear and fluffy cumuli. She spies a frog in a former pond, now just a puddle of cracked mud, and has a helpful “brainstorm.” Lichtenheld’s depictions of Cloudette puffing herself up for a fulsome downpour will delight children, and funny turns of phrase (“Even the higher-ups were impressed”) will engage adults, too. The whimsy would nicely complement a preschool or primary weather unit. The author even uses rainwater for the watercolor pictures. (“Thank you, clouds,” he writes in the media statement.) Sweet and sunny. (Picture book. 3-7)
Pub Date: March 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-8050-8776-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano/Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Feb. 10, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2011
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