Next book

NIBBLES

THE DINOSAUR GUIDE

A delicious escapade that young librivores (to use a more logical coinage) will snap up.

A voracious “bookivore” leaves ragged holes behind as it chews its way through an introduction to dinosaurs.

A T. Rex peering hungrily through the large die-cut hole in the front cover hints at what’s in store for yellow, Pikachu-like Nibbles. Not that the diminutive book monster cares that much, as he chews his way through quick introductions to Triceratops (“big bums and large stompy feet too”), Diplodocus (“I’m the Prince of PARPS!”), and Velociraptor—keeping just ahead of the outraged dinos and indignant narrator by lurking beneath flaps or gnawing his way through to the next page. Along with jokes, poop references, and quick snacks of dinosaur facts, Yarlett supplies loose cartoon portraits of pale-toned prehistoric creatures in simplified settings. Speaking of snacks, Nibbles almost becomes one…before the big T. Rex that snatches him up spits him out hard enough to propel him right through the rear cover. “It’s a comet!” ventures a saurian witness. “What’s a comet?” Ominously: “We’ll find out soon.”

A delicious escapade that young librivores (to use a more logical coinage) will snap up. (Novelty picture book. 5-7)

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2017

ISBN: 978-1-61067-643-4

Page Count: 36

Publisher: Kane Miller

Review Posted Online: July 16, 2017

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2017

Next book

SYLVIA'S SPINACH

Very young gardeners will need more information, but for certain picky eaters, the suggested strategy just might work.

A young spinach hater becomes a spinach lover after she has to grow her own in a class garden.

Unable to trade away the seed packet she gets from her teacher for tomatoes, cukes or anything else more palatable, Sylvia reluctantly plants and nurtures a pot of the despised veggie then transplants it outside in early spring. By the end of school, only the plot’s lettuce, radishes and spinach are actually ready to eat (talk about a badly designed class project!)—and Sylvia, once she nerves herself to take a nibble, discovers that the stuff is “not bad.” She brings home an armful and enjoys it from then on in every dish: “And that was the summer Sylvia Spivens said yes to spinach.” Raff uses unlined brushwork to give her simple cartoon illustrations a pleasantly freehand, airy look, and though Pryor skips over the (literally, for spinach) gritty details in both the story and an afterword, she does cover gardening basics in a simple and encouraging way.

Very young gardeners will need more information, but for certain picky eaters, the suggested strategy just might work. (Picture book. 5-7)

Pub Date: Nov. 6, 2012

ISBN: 978-0-9836615-1-1

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Readers to Eaters

Review Posted Online: Sept. 25, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2012

Next book

THE GIRL WHO LOVED WILD HORSES

            There are many parallel legends – the seal women, for example, with their strange sad longings – but none is more direct than this American Indian story of a girl who is carried away in a horses’ stampede…to ride thenceforth by the side of a beautiful stallion who leads the wild horses.  The girl had always loved horses, and seemed to understand them “in a special way”; a year after her disappearance her people find her riding beside the stallion, calf in tow, and take her home despite his strong resistance.  But she is unhappy and returns to the stallion; after that, a beautiful mare is seen riding always beside him.  Goble tells the story soberly, allowing it to settle, to find its own level.  The illustrations are in the familiar striking Goble style, but softened out here and there with masses of flowers and foliage – suitable perhaps for the switch in subject matter from war to love, but we miss the spanking clean design of Custer’s Last Battle and The Fetterman Fight.          6-7

Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1978

ISBN: 0689845049

Page Count: -

Publisher: Bradbury

Review Posted Online: April 26, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1978

Close Quickview