Bobo is a large, white dog with a big, black nose who lives a pampered life alongside his fellow pet, a well-behaved cat who wears a proper apron when washing dishes. Their owner, Mrs. Birdhead (who inexplicably wears a nesting bird strapped to her head) has failed to train her dog in the rudiments of indoor behavior. When Bobo continually misbehaves, he is banished to the backyard, and the cat attempts to end their unhappy separation by giving Bobo obedience lessons. The standard obedience school commands are interpreted with amusing results, as Bobo’s idea of “sit” is lounging in a comfy chair and “heel” means literally kicking up his heels. Children will enjoy the humorous sight of Bobo in his pajamas practicing “lie down” and “roll over” in his own four-poster bed, as the cat reads instructions from a dog-obedience guidebook. The quirky humor in the brief text is matched by the funny antics of the floppy canine in the illustrations as he tries to be a good dog, but always in his own way. (Picture book. 3-5)
Pub Date: April 1, 2006
ISBN: 1-58234-683-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
BOOK REVIEW
A charmingly loud and lighthearted friendship story.
A freckle-faced white child with a mass of red curls piled three times the height of her head is flying her kite near a snowcapped mountaintop when—“snap!”—the string breaks, and the toy is blown into a sleeping bear’s cave, coming to rest on his belly.
Readers are cued into the nonscary absurdity as they observe the orange-furred bear napping in a Froggy Hollow Summer Camp T-shirt stretched across his huge belly, a tiny teddy bear tucked in his arm. As the girl reaches for her kite, the bear rolls over, crushing it: “crunch!” The girl is shocked into a fit of righteous anger, blaming the bear for breaking her toy. “HORRIBLE BEAR!”—and so begins the refrain of her angry tantrum. The team that brought readers the adorable Wolfie the Bunny (2014) continues their success here. OHora’s paintings are boldly colored and layered: a yellow stuffed bunny wears a teal jacket; the purple-and-black–clad little girl strides in red Converse high-top sneakers over a pea-green lawn. The limited language and solid acrylic paintings work together beautifully to convey emotion. When the little girl realizes that the bear didn’t break her toy on purpose, one word speaks volumes: “Oh.” Her face fills the entire page, her feelings indicated with black dot eyes, a couple of curved lines, and a black dot mouth.
A charmingly loud and lighthearted friendship story. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: April 5, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-316-28283-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Jan. 8, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2016
“What’s big?” asks a pleasant pink pig as he compares himself to cows, cars, trucks, streets, the neighborhood, the city, and the earth, and finally to the universe, which “makes everything seem small.” Although the concept of relative size is well taken, the expansion from self to universe is flawed by the incongruity of some of the images. The pig and the cow squeeze into a model T–type car that is stuck in the mud, but are towed by a modern tow truck into a modern city. In the final sequence, the sun seems smaller than the earth. A simple verse pattern carries the lilting text with each verse ending with the repetitive phrase “What’s bigger than . . .” Florian’s double-paged watercolor paints and colored pencil are soft and muted, sometimes too muted, particularly in background areas. Occasional flashes of humor illustrate the text as the cow and the pig travel through a city populated by animals at work and at play. It ends with an amusing image of the pig as a constellation in the universe. Not Florian’s best effort, but a good conversation-starter with a young child about comparative size. (Picture book. 3-5)
Pub Date: Oct. 31, 2000
ISBN: 0-688-17125-7
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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