The delightfully determined small person introduced in Sophie's Snail (1989) celebrates her fifth birthday on Christmas Day; honoring her plan to become a "lady farmer," her parents and twin brothers give her a splendid toy farm, but her live pets are still limited to the wood lice, slugs, earthworms, and so on she keeps in the potting shed. To these she hopes to add a stray cat she's feeding; Dad doesn't like cats, but—with the connivance of great-great-aunt Al, who suggests importing a mouse into the kitchen—Sophie gets her way. Meanwhile, she's started school, where she negotiates in her own inimitable way with classmate Duncan ("not only a malleable little boy but very greedy") and old enemy Dawn. A predictable conclusion—Dad is entirely won over, and "Tom" has kittens—but King-Smith's narration in this sequel is wonderfully crisp and unsentimental, while bright, quietly persistent Sophie (like Lowry's Sam) has rare charm. The language has suffered more Americanization than Sophie's Snail, detracting from the pleasant British flavor; on the other hand, Parkins's amusing cross-hatched drawings, nicely blending humor and deft characterizations, are superior. (Fiction. 5-10)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1992
ISBN: 1564023737
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1992
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
Rylant (Henry and Mudge and the Sneaky Crackers, 1998, etc.) slips into a sentimental mode for this latest outing of the boy and his dog, as she sends Mudge and Henry and his parents off on a camping trip. Each character is attended to, each personality sketched in a few brief words: Henry's mother is the camping veteran with outdoor savvy; Henry's father doesn't know a tent stake from a marshmallow fork, but he's got a guitar for campfire entertainment; and the principals are their usual ready-for-fun selves. There are sappy moments, e.g., after an evening of star- gazing, Rylant sends the family off to bed with: ``Everyone slept safe and sound and there were no bears, no scares. Just the clean smell of trees . . . and wonderful green dreams.'' With its nice tempo, the story is as toasty as its campfire and swaddled in Stevenson's trusty artwork. (Fiction. 6-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-689-81175-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1998
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