This exploration of water just isn’t solid enough to merit purchase.
A small boy imagines the travels of water from a jar through steps of the water cycle and around the world.
When a rain shower interrupts Issac’s play, he empties a jar of water into a mountain pool. He runs downhill, following his water into a river that goes by his family home. Continuing in a small boat, he sails through an idealized countryside and a curiously empty city (the single human empties a bucket out a riverside window) as far as the ocean. The boat vanishes from the story as readers see the water encountering a whale, icebergs, ocean deeps, and a lightning storm. The water becomes mist, a cloud over faraway African countries, and life-giving rain. After one more cycle through the ocean, it finally becomes rain falling on Issac’s pool again. Watery digital paintings of a dreamlike landscape provide pictorial reinforcement. Issac appears white. The art is lovely, but the exposition is awkward in this British import. Readers will struggle with long sentences where the meaning is not immediately clear: “He followed them to the river that / ran past his home and then plunged down a waterfall.” There are factual errors. Whales don’t spout swallowed water through their blowholes; that’s warm air from their lungs. Water doesn’t rise from the ocean as steam; that’s vapor. For an equally child-friendly and more accurate account of this often described process, choose Miranda Paul and Jason Chin’s Water Is Water (2015).
This exploration of water just isn’t solid enough to merit purchase. (Informational picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 20, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5362-0575-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Templar/Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 7, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2019
This pleasant look at gardening in a city setting reflects a growing trend.
Several inner-city children work together to plant seeds and cultivate their own gardens, transforming their little “anywhere farms” into a lush, green community garden covering a vacant city lot.
A pink-cheeked little girl in overalls receives a single seed from a helpful tan-skinned neighbor on the title page, and she then inspires a flurry of gardening in her neighborhood with children and adults of different ethnicities joining in, including a white boy who uses a wheelchair. The bouncy, rhyming text conveys the basic requirements of growing plants from seeds as well as suggesting a wide variety of unusual containers for growing plants. Several leading questions about the plant growth cycle are interspersed within the story, set in large type on full pages that show a seed gradually sprouting and growing into a huge sunflower on the final, wordless page. The joyful text makes growing flowers and vegetables seem easy, showing plants spilling out of alternative containers as well as more traditional raised beds and the concluding, large garden plot. The text focuses on the titular concept of an “anywhere farm,” without differentiating between farms and gardens, but this conceit is part of the amusing, rollicking tone. Detailed, soft-focus illustrations in mixed media use an autumnal palette of muted green, peach, and tan that don’t quite match the buoyant flavor of the cheerful text.
This pleasant look at gardening in a city setting reflects a growing trend. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 14, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-7636-7499-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2016
Unusual illustrations enhance an engaging, informative narrative.
What can a worm do?
A little worm sets off on a “twirl” to “see the world.” But when it overhears a human referring to it as “just a worm,” its feelings are hurt. The worm asks other critters—including a caterpillar, a spider, a dragonfly—what they can do. After each answer (turn into a butterfly, spin silk thread, fly), the worm becomes more and more dejected because it can’t do any of these things. “Maybe I am just a worm.” But then the worm encounters a ladybug, who eats aphids and other insects, and the worm realizes that it eats dead plants and animals and keeps gardens clean. And though the worm can’t pollinate like the bee, it does create castings (poop) that help plants grow and stay healthy. These abilities, the worm realizes in triumph, are important! The cleverness of this story lies in its lighthearted, effective dissemination of information about various insects as well as earthworms. It doesn’t hurt that the expressive little worm is downright adorable, with emotions that will resonate with anyone who has felt unimportant. The stunning illustrations are done in quilled paper—a centuries-old technique that involves assembling strips of colored paper into shapes—which adds sparkle and originality. A tutorial of how to make a quilled butterfly and a page on earthworm facts round out the book. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Unusual illustrations enhance an engaging, informative narrative. (Informational picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 14, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-06-321256-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2022
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