A bit silly but good fun.
Scout, a female German shepherd, is very excited to be trying for her Care in the Community badge at Sausage Dreams Puppy Academy.
In Scout’s anthropomorphic world, dogs don’t appear to be pets. As the daughter of police dogs, she naturally wants to do well at school and grow up to be just like her dedicated parents. Unfortunately, because she returns a lost teddy bear to a child on her way to school (exhibiting, as readers will enjoy noting, excellent citizenship skills), Scout arrives dirty and late. Flustered, she fails part of the test and is relegated to guarding the puppy treats, stored in a shed, instead of getting to complete the badge requirements. When the treats disappear from right behind her back, she is unfairly blamed and runs off in shame (so puppylike of her!). Then she discovers a notorious sausage thief and rescues an extended family of mice (the puppy-treat thieves, it turns out). All’s well that ends well. Scout’s good-humored, kidlike adventures are related in very large print, accompanied by lots of equally cheery drawings, making this an accessible read for children newly transitioning to chapter books. An appealing color photograph of a German shepherd puppy on the cover will instantly attract readers.
A bit silly but good fun. (Fantasy. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 20, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-62779-794-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2016
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
As Captain Awesome would say, this kid is “MI-TEE!” (Fiction. 5-8)
The town of Sunnyview got a little bit safer when 8-year-old Eugene McGillicudy moved in.
Just like his comic-book mentor, Super Dude, Eugene, aka Captain Awesome, is on a one-man mission is to save the world from supervillains, like the nefarious “Queen Stinkypants from Planet Baby.” Just as Eugene suspected, plenty of new supervillains await him at Sunnyview Elementary. Are Meredith Mooney and the mind-reading Ms. Beasley secretly working together to try and force Eugene to reveal his secret identity? Will Principal Brick Foot succeed in throwing Captain Awesome into the “Dungeon of Detention?” Fortunately, Eugene isn’t forced to go it alone. Charlie Thomas Jones, fellow comic-book lover and Super Dude fan, stands ready and willing to help. When the class hamster goes missing, Captain Awesome must don his cape and, with the help of his new best friend, ride to the rescue. Kirby’s funny and engaging third-person narration and O’Connor’s hilarious illustrations make the book easily accessible and enormously appealing, particularly to readers who have recently graduated to chapter books. But it is the quirky, mischievous Eugene that really makes this book special. His energy and humor are contagious, and his dogged commitment to his superhero alter ego is enough to make anyone a believer.
As Captain Awesome would say, this kid is “MI-TEE!” (Fiction. 5-8)Pub Date: April 3, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4424-4090-6
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
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