The latest installment of Lizard’s adventures (Lizard’s Home, 1999, etc.) begins with Lizard exuberantly dancing and singing, until he stomps on Skunk’s toes by accident. Wily Skunk plays on Lizard’s guilty conscience, convincing Lizard to wait on him hand and foot until Lizard catches on. Once he discovers that Skunk’s toes are perfectly healthy, Lizard must find a crafty way to quit being at Skunk’s beck and call, since he doesn’t want to risk Skunk’s stink by making him angry. On his last errand for Skunk, Lizard ventures further and further away, and Skunk must follow him in order to get his demands met. It’s soon apparent that the toes have completely healed, and Lizard throws a party to celebrate Skunk’s “newfound” health and distract Skunk from the fact that he’s been tricked. Young readers will quickly spot Skunk’s duplicity, and will cheer Lizard’s ingenious solution to making Skunk reveal himself. The simple, bright illustrations, full of life and outlined in thin black, perfectly convey the sweetness of the animals’ friendship. Lizard’s indefatigable joviality is hard to resist, and his song—“Sing zing-a-ling. / Sing a zoli-o. / Follow me / And around we’ll go!”—will inspire readers and listeners to sing and leap along with him. (Picture book. 4-7)
Pub Date: April 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-06-009083-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2003
Fun times, fond friends, and a festive farmyard setting—little ones will be charmed.
Beep! Beep! Beep! Toad and Little Blue Truck get ready for a hayride.
After the titular vehicle is loaded with hay, Toad is nowhere to be found. “Beep! Beep! Beep! Where are you, Toad?” asks Little Blue Truck. All the barnyard animals look for him. Sheep searches the meadow. Goose and Duck check the pond. Others pitch in, too, but Toad seems to have disappeared…until Hen hears snoring coming from the pile of hay in the back of Little Blue Truck. Although the text’s scansion is imperfect in places (adults may want to pre-read to ensure a smooth read-aloud), the bouncy meter and rhyming text nevertheless capture the energy of the search and the farmyard community’s concern for Toad’s safety, making this a solid storytime choice. Eye-catching illustrations with rich, fully saturated colors balance the right level of detail while still highlighting the animal that is the focus of each verse. By introducing one farm animal at a time, Schertle also helps the youngest readers begin to identify barnyard animals by name and understand their unique farm homes. Traditional animal sounds are part of the text, and listeners will add them to their vocabulary. It all ends with the promised hayride, bringing the tale to a joyous ending.
Fun times, fond friends, and a festive farmyard setting—little ones will be charmed. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 18, 2026
ISBN: 9780063436121
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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