Bowen (Stranded on Plimoth Plantation 1626, 1994) makes a brave and not very successful effort to turn some two dozen of Kimble’s folk-art livestock portraits into a connected narrative. Seeking commissions, an itinerant 19th-century artist seems to follow an animal thief through a series of Vermont towns. After puzzling over such clues as hearing several animals utter “Ite-osh-urr,” and learning that no white animals are stolen, he solves the mystery at a county fair in Castleton, at which the culprit is revealed as a “whitewasher” attempting to put disguised livestock up for auction. The painter collects a reward, allowing him to realize a long-held dream of visiting Africa. Applying thin layers of paint to distressed antique wood, Kimble depicts big, bushy cats, dignified horses, and other creatures in simple, usually rural settings, sliding into whimsy with a proud rooster decked out in red, white, and blue, then closes with a spread of elephants, giraffes, and the like. Children will enjoy the individual pictures, but next to such folk-art showcases as Barbara Ann Porte’s Chickens! Chickens! (1995) and Black Elephant with a Brown Ear (in Alabama) (1996), this comes off as a rambling, wordy contrivance. (Picture book. 8-10)
Pub Date: May 31, 2001
ISBN: 0-06-028408-0
Page Count: 48
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
PLB 0-688-15338-0 Sometimes the way the cookie crumbles is a saving grace, particularly in this clever spoof on a hard-boiled detective tale, set inside the cookie jar. The “tough cookie” who narrates is a trenchcoat-wearing, gruff detective who came from a good family—“Lots of dough. Lived the high life. Top of the Jar.” But when he hit bottom, he became a P.I. Now he’s tracking the culprit who’s making mayhem out of the cookie jar by snatching away cookies such as the Pfefferneuses, and roughing up the tough cookie’s partner, Chips. Some quick thinking on the part of the P.I.’s delicious (a politically correct adjective, in this case) former girlfriend, Pecan Sandy, and a crowd of cookie crumbs thwarts the greedy fingers once and for all. The hero gets his man—or hand—and the girl. Wisniewski (The Secret Knowledge of Grown-Ups, 1998, etc.) is dead-on witty, while his torn-paper collages have a authentically crumbly look. The puns are numerous, but good, and visual details’such as the map of the Jar, a wanted poster showing the shadowy outline “Fingers,” and more—guarantee lots of giggles for onlookers young and old. (Picture book. 4-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-688-15337-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1999
Green-scaled gumshoe Chet Gecko hits his stride in this hard-boiled follow-up to The Chameleon Wore Chartreuse (p. 475). What with a plug-ugly new janitor, new Assistant Principal Clint Squint’s “PEN [sic] STATE” tattoo and a formerly sourpuss Principal Zero suddenly turned eerily sweet-tempered, there is definitely something rotten at Emerson Hickey Elementary School. Leave it to Chet, his mockingbird sidekick Natalie Attired, and little Popper, a tree frog schoolmate on hyperdrive, to dig up the dirt: the real Principal Zero has been kidnapped by thugs who plan to smooth-talk the PTA into turning Emerson Hickey into a vocational school—for young crooks. Hale throws in wisecracks by the handful, terrible jokes (“Why was the tuna so sad when he lost his wife? He lobster and couldn’t flounder! Ha ha!”), and daffy clues, tucks in an occasional broadly comic pen-and-ink sketch of his trenchcoat-clad shamus and associates, and brings the pot, er, plot, to a boil at a raucous PTA meeting that sees the crooks nabbed in the nick. Hold on to your fedoras: this gecko’s going places. (Fiction. 8-10)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-15-202271-6
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2000
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
