A giggle-worthy, whimsical adventure.
Backyard hijinks send a baby on a brief trip into space in Kimsly’s picture book.
When big sister Grace, who has fair skin and brown hair, ties her baby sibling’s highchair to a tree branch, neither she nor the baby are prepared for the baby to get flung into space. Among the stars, the baby spots a bear (Ursa Major) and then a giant toucan that looks quite a lot like the Hubble Space Telescope. Soon, the ISS and some top-hat wearing astronauts come into view, followed by the moon, which is eating a hamburger. After spotting the cow, the dish, and the spoon (and an asteroid-residing alien named Lloyd), the baby heads back toward Earth, to the disappointment of the heavenly bodies: “The last thing I saw, my brief trip winding down, were the planets and Sun, waving bye with a frown.” Kimsly’s stanzas scan well, with consistent and inventive rhymes likely to stretch the vocabulary of even advanced readers (the moon is “gaining girth,” and Lloyd is a “chummy alien”). The story’s humor is effective—Pluto asking “Hey guys, am I in or out?” will amuse parents who grew up with nine planets to name. Cañas’ cartoon illustrations, which embrace the silliness of the text, feature painterly backgrounds to depict the space voyage.
A giggle-worthy, whimsical adventure.Pub Date: Dec. 8, 2022
ISBN: 9798987444108
Page Count: 24
Publisher: EDK Enterprises
Review Posted Online: Dec. 12, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
PERSPECTIVES
A jam-packed opener sure to satisfy lovers of the princess genre.
Ice princess Lina must navigate family and school in this early chapter read.
The family picnic is today. This is not a typical gathering, since Lina’s maternal relatives are a royal family of Windtamers who have power over the weather and live in castles floating on clouds. Lina herself is mixed race, with black hair and a tan complexion like her Asian-presenting mother’s; her Groundling father appears to be a white human. While making a grand entrance at the castle of her grandfather, the North Wind, she fails to successfully ride a gust of wind and crashes in front of her entire family. This prompts her stern grandfather to ask that Lina move in with him so he can teach her to control her powers. Desperate to avoid this, Lina and her friend Claudia, who is black, get Lina accepted at the Hilltop Science and Arts Academy. Lina’s parents allow her to go as long as she does lessons with grandpa on Saturdays. However, fitting in at a Groundling school is rough, especially when your powers start freak winter storms! With the story unfurling in diary format, bright-pink–highlighted grayscale illustrations help move the plot along. There are slight gaps in the storytelling and the pacing is occasionally uneven, but Lina is full of spunk and promotes self-acceptance.
A jam-packed opener sure to satisfy lovers of the princess genre. (Fantasy. 5-8)Pub Date: June 25, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-338-35393-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2019
A sweet, if oft-told, story.
A plush toy rabbit bonds with a boy and watches him grow into adulthood.
The boy receives the blue bunny for his birthday and immediately becomes attached to it. Unbeknownst to him, the ungendered bunny is sentient; it engages in dialogue with fellow toys, giving readers insight into its thoughts. The bunny's goal is to have grand adventures when the boy grows up and no longer needs its company. The boy spends many years playing imaginatively with the bunny, holding it close during both joyous and sorrowful times and taking it along on family trips. As a young man, he marries, starts a family, and hands over the beloved toy to his toddler-aged child in a crib. The bunny's epiphany—that he does not need to wait for great adventures since all his dreams have already come true in the boy's company—is explicitly stated in the lengthy text, which is in many ways similar to The Velveteen Rabbit (1922). The illustrations, which look hand-painted but were digitally created, are moderately sentimental with an impressionistic dreaminess (one illustration even includes a bunny-shaped cloud in the sky) and a warm glow throughout. The depiction of a teenage male openly displaying his emotions—hugging his beloved childhood toy for example—is refreshing. All human characters present as White expect for one of the boy’s friends who is Black.
A sweet, if oft-told, story. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-72825-448-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2022
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