A sweet, rambunctious celebration of babyhood that begs for repeated readings.
An unexpected delivery brings chaos, joy, and an abundance of love.
“One Thursday morning, a box of babies arrives at this door.” With this whimsical premise, Xiao has crafted a heartwarming tale that perfectly captures the exhausting yet rewarding reality of caring for little ones. Seven distinctively expressive round-faced infants—varying in complexion—quickly make themselves at home, requiring feeding, bathing, and entertaining. The simple text is gracefully balanced with the visual exuberance of babies tumbling across pages, exploring their surroundings, and eventually snuggling up together. Xiao employs a restrained palette in her gouache and pencil illustrations—the tots’ yellow sleepers contrast against mostly muted backgrounds—creating scenes that are pleasingly detailed yet never overwhelming. Each baby has individual personality traits conveyed through subtle facial expressions and positioning, enticing children to follow their favorites through the pages. The diverse caregivers respond with good-natured acceptance to the sudden responsibility, modeling joyful adaptability amid domestic disruption. The story ends with a delightful invitation to readers—“What will they do next?”—cleverly setting up a potential sequel while also encouraging children to imagine their own adventures for these seven charming youngsters.
A sweet, rambunctious celebration of babyhood that begs for repeated readings. (Picture book. 1-5)Pub Date: Sept. 2, 2025
ISBN: 9781536245097
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2025
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
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Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come.
Little Blue Truck and his pal Toad meet friends old and new on a springtime drive through the country.
This lift-the-flap, interactive entry in the popular Little Blue Truck series lacks the narrative strength and valuable life lessons of the original Little Blue Truck (2008) and its sequel, Little Blue Truck Leads the Way (2009). Both of those books, published for preschoolers rather than toddlers, featured rich storylines, dramatic, kinetic illustrations, and simple but valuable life lessons—the folly of taking oneself too seriously, the importance of friends, and the virtue of taking turns, for example. At about half the length and with half as much text as the aforementioned titles, this volume is a much quicker read. Less a story than a vernal celebration, the book depicts a bucolic drive through farmland and encounters with various animals and their young along the way. Beautifully rendered two-page tableaux teem with butterflies, blossoms, and vibrant pastel, springtime colors. Little Blue greets a sheep standing in the door of a barn: “Yoo-hoo, Sheep! / Beep-beep! / What’s new?” Folding back the durable, card-stock flap reveals the barn’s interior and an adorable set of twin lambs. Encounters with a duck and nine ducklings, a cow with a calf, a pig with 10 (!) piglets, a family of bunnies, and a chicken with a freshly hatched chick provide ample opportunity for counting and vocabulary work.
Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come. (Board book. 1-4)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-544-93809-0
Page Count: 16
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
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