In 1951, beloved illustrator Williams (Stuart Little, Bedtime for Frances, the Little House books) published a novel called The Adventures of Benjamin Pink. Rosemary Wells has colored reproductions of the original black-and-white illustrations, using paints available in the ’50s in a palette from Williams’s own work. This episode has text that has been abridged for a picture-book format and the result is old-fashioned, but charming. On a clear morning, bunny Benjamin Pink decides it is a perfect day for fishing, and off he goes, waving to his wife Emily. But the day clouds over, a storm comes up, and Benjamin finds himself shipwrecked on a desert island. Lo! He finds a pirates’ buried treasure chest. He meets a turtle named Theodore, and, over mint tea and berries, they try to work out a way of getting Benjamin, and the treasure, home. Benjamin builds a raft, the turtle enlists his friend the porpoise, but another storm comes up, and our bunny hero finds himself without a ride and on the wrong island, with the treasure in the hands of monkeys. He starts over, is towed home by a shark, and finds his Emily waiting. There’s still a pearl in his ear left over from his adventures, but he tells Emily that she’s his true treasure. While the story is a bit forced, the images are vintage Williams, warm and fuzzy and just right. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: March 31, 2001
ISBN: 0-06-028740-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2001
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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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