It's a simple story that emphasizes fun over substance, but the visuals are so crisp and adorable that they'll appeal to...
More Hello Kitty than Peter Rabbit, this very modern app with minimalist illustrations and clever jokes tucked throughout is a cute, if lightweight, cat-and-mouse story.
Porkchop, a perfectly white cat with a small circle for a body and larger circle for a head (with triangle ears, of course), lives in a house with red wallpaper, doors and hanging lights. He also lives with an infestation of mice: fat, oval mice who've been "nibbling on his doughnuts." Porkchop pursues one mouse out of the house, across a field of spinning flowers, through an autumnal forest, over icy mountains and a desert and through a neon-lit city, among other places. There are visual jokes throughout, like Easter Island statues on one page or a beach book called Great Catsby, but many of them are too subtle, or displayed in such small text that they'll be lost on younger readers. The animation isn't jaw-dropping—it's only used in small portions on each page—but it's effective. Mice eating, birds flying and a giant blue moon spinning are activated with button presses or by flicking a finger. The built-in narration's British-accented take on the material is bright and friendly. An option to record one's own narration is also nicely done; a simple microphone icon appears on each page. Porkchop's chase leads back to the house, where the mice have made a peace offering: a huge pile of donuts to share.
It's a simple story that emphasizes fun over substance, but the visuals are so crisp and adorable that they'll appeal to readers who are looking for less-traditional art styles in their storybooks. (iPad storybook app. 2-8)Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2012
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Ant Hive Games
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2012
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own...
The sturdy Little Blue Truck is back for his third adventure, this time delivering Christmas trees to his band of animal pals.
The truck is decked out for the season with a Christmas wreath that suggests a nose between headlights acting as eyeballs. Little Blue loads up with trees at Toad’s Trees, where five trees are marked with numbered tags. These five trees are counted and arithmetically manipulated in various ways throughout the rhyming story as they are dropped off one by one to Little Blue’s friends. The final tree is reserved for the truck’s own use at his garage home, where he is welcomed back by the tree salestoad in a neatly circular fashion. The last tree is already decorated, and Little Blue gets a surprise along with readers, as tiny lights embedded in the illustrations sparkle for a few seconds when the last page is turned. Though it’s a gimmick, it’s a pleasant surprise, and it fits with the retro atmosphere of the snowy country scenes. The short, rhyming text is accented with colored highlights, red for the animal sounds and bright green for the numerical words in the Christmas-tree countdown.
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own tree that will put a twinkle in a toddler’s eyes. (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-544-32041-3
Page Count: 24
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
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