For young adventurers and explorers.
A pup’s wanderlust suddenly gets him into a seafaring predicament.
Jack, a curious terrier, loves to explore. So when the wind blows his house’s door open one day, the temptation is too great. He scampers outside and trots down the road. As he crests a hill, Jack suddenly sees a vast expanse of sparkling blue. The ocean! After stowing away on a lobster boat, Jack can’t wait for an adventure. But then, the sea turns rough: “The sea heaves the boat, and the waves splash the deck. / The rain beats down hard on Jack’s back and his neck.” Poor Jack. This is not what he had in mind. Luckily the voyage is only a few days long, and the boat returns to the same harbor. Weary, hungry, and downtrodden, Jack slowly limps toward home—a far cry from the exuberant energy of the previous trip on the same path. The artwork’s sunny hues match the warmth of the loving reunion between Jack, his light-skinned owner, and his brother, Kes. Employing the many stages of an adventure—quest, drama, return—McLean crafts a brief tale of rolling emotions. Intriguing word choices and varied verses will hold readers’ attention, though the rhyming does, at times, hold the narrative back slightly. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
For young adventurers and explorers. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: April 4, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-63163-698-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: North Star Editions
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Serve this superbly designed title to all who relish slightly scary stories.
Kids know vegetables can be scary, but rarely are edible roots out to get someone. In this whimsical mock-horror tale, carrots nearly frighten the whiskers off Jasper Rabbit, an interloper at Crackenhopper Field.
Jasper loves carrots, especially those “free for the taking.” He pulls some in the morning, yanks out a few in the afternoon, and comes again at night to rip out more. Reynolds builds delicious suspense with succinct language that allows understatements to be fully exploited in Brown’s hilarious illustrations. The cartoon pictures, executed in pencil and then digitally colored, are in various shades of gray and serve as a perfectly gloomy backdrop for the vegetables’ eerie orange on each page. “Jasper couldn’t get enough carrots … / … until they started following him.” The plot intensifies as Jasper not only begins to hear the veggies nearby, but also begins to see them everywhere. Initially, young readers will wonder if this is all a product of Jasper’s imagination. Was it a few snarling carrots or just some bathing items peeking out from behind the shower curtain? The ending truly satisfies both readers and the book’s characters alike. And a lesson on greed goes down like honey instead of a forkful of spinach.
Serve this superbly designed title to all who relish slightly scary stories. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 21, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4424-0297-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2012
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
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