by Gita Wolf ; illustrated by Dhwani Shah with Bhaddu Hamir ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 15, 2018
Not much beyond a gimmick, and one that’s suitable only for home libraries.
Die-cut animal shapes invite young artists to fill in traced outlines and create stories around them in this Indian import.
As a drawing game, at least, this is definitely on the minimalist side. Hamir, a Gujarati artist associated with the Indigenous Pithora style, contributes a few large, generic animal shapes—a monkey, a bird, two identical whales, a camel, and a cat—cut into sheets that are interleaved among the pages. These can be flipped right and left so that facing titular “twins” can be traced onto pages that are otherwise largely blank except for scattered dots, a few small geometric shapes, lightly traced figures, and, in one spread, a set of empty dialogue balloons, all added by Shah. Wolf supplies five instructional story prompts in small type that progress from a simple “What happens next?” to more developed, and promising, scenarios (“Oops! He’s eaten his twin’s meal! Draw what happens next”). The book concludes with a general invitation to conjure a story from scratch on a totally blank final page. Young yarn-spinners may enjoy the exercises, but they aren’t going to come away with any sense of Pithora motifs or the traditional stories they are typically created to tell.
Not much beyond a gimmick, and one that’s suitable only for home libraries. (Coloring book. 4-6)Pub Date: June 15, 2018
ISBN: 978-93-83145-71-3
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Tara Publishing
Review Posted Online: June 10, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018
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More by Kanchana Arni
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edited by Kanchana Arni & Gita Wolf
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by Koki Oguma & Gita Wolf ; illustrated by Koki Oguma
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by Subhash Vyam ; illustrated by Subhash Vyam ; translated by Gita Wolf
by Nancy Loewen ; illustrated by Sachiko Yoshikawa ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 2011
Loewen’s story is a simple snapshot of kindergarten graduation day, and it stays true to form, with Yoshikawa’s artwork resembling photos that might be placed in an album—and the illustrations cheer, a mixed media of saturated color, remarkable depth and joyful expression. The author comfortably captures the hesitations of making the jump from kindergarten to first grade without making a fuss about it, and she makes the prospect something worth the effort. Trepidation aside, this is a reminder of how much fun kindergarten was: your own cubbyhole, the Halloween parade, losing a tooth, “the last time we’ll ever sit criss-cross applesauce together.” But there is also the fledgling’s pleasure at shucking off the past—swabbing the desks, tossing out the stubbiest crayons, taking the pictures off the wall—and surging into the future. Then there is graduation itself: donning the mortarboards, trooping into the auditorium—“Mr. Meyer starts playing a serious song on the piano. It makes me want to cry. It makes me want to march”—which will likely have a few adult readers feeling the same. (Picture book. 4-5)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-7614-5807-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Marshall Cavendish
Review Posted Online: Jan. 8, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2011
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by Nancy Loewen & Linda Hayen ; illustrated by Yana Zybina
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by Nancy Loewen ; illustrated by Hazel Michelle Quintanilla
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by Nancy Loewen ; illustrated by Hazel Michelle Quintanilla
by Tony Ross & illustrated by Tony Ross ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 2010
This long-running British series (the first Little Princess book was published in 1986) has been adapted for television there. In this installment, her dad (in a jacket and tie, wearing his crown) has read her a story and is about to turn off the light when the Little Princess shouts, “I WANT MY LIGHT ON!”—with her entire face subsumed into one of those scarlet, tooth-edged mouths. She’s not afraid of the dark but of ghosts. Dad checks under the bed, and General, Admiral, Doctor and Maid assure her there are no ghosts. The Little Princess’s room is a bright yellow, but readers see glimpses of the castle’s arches and stone steps past her doorway—and then there is a little ghost behind her bedpost, with a skeleton toy the shape of Little Princess’s own stuffie. Ghost and Princess scare each other, and he dashes off to his mother, who, as she stirs her pot of frog, worm and spider stew, assures him that there are no such things as little girls.... The pictures are clear, bold and exaggerated to great humorous effect. (Picture book. 4-6)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-7613-6443-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Andersen Press USA
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2010
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More by Michael Rosen
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by Michael Rosen ; illustrated by Tony Ross
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by Jeanne Willis ; illustrated by Tony Ross
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by Jeanne Willis ; illustrated by Tony Ross
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