by Hannah Eliot ; illustrated by Daniel Roode ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 11, 2014
Still, parents of children with new glasses prescriptions may find this novelty useful for their home libraries—public...
A clever concept presents a variety of different faces and separate pairs of glasses to try on each, executed with eye-catching graphics designed to appeal to hip young parents.
Unfortunately, it's difficult to imagine a board-book–age child understanding the concepts or being able to manipulate the pieces of this book. Bright blue, black, gray, white and silver graphics highlight different kinds of glasses for a variety of positions and uses: a pilot, a rock star, for reading, for calculating, for "someone totally FAB," for someone looking for romance, for a birthday party. Cutouts of seven styles of glasses are included in a pocket in the front, to be inserted in a very small tab on the corresponding page. However, only five slots are available to receive tabs, and inserting the tab requires a degree of manual dexterity that is not realistic for young children. Fortunately, once inserted, the glasses seem to stay inserted, even with repeated page turns. Some of the metaphors (“true love is blind,” for example) are also beyond the understanding of literal-minded young children.
Still, parents of children with new glasses prescriptions may find this novelty useful for their home libraries—public libraries will want to give it a miss. (Board book. 3-6)Pub Date: Nov. 11, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4814-1791-4
Page Count: 16
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
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by Jimmy Fallon ; illustrated by Miguel Ordóñez ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 9, 2015
Plotless and pointless, the book clearly exists only because its celebrity author wrote it.
A succession of animal dads do their best to teach their young to say “Dada” in this picture-book vehicle for Fallon.
A grumpy bull says, “DADA!”; his calf moos back. A sad-looking ram insists, “DADA!”; his lamb baas back. A duck, a bee, a dog, a rabbit, a cat, a mouse, a donkey, a pig, a frog, a rooster, and a horse all fail similarly, spread by spread. A final two-spread sequence finds all of the animals arrayed across the pages, dads on the verso and children on the recto. All the text prior to this point has been either iterations of “Dada” or animal sounds in dialogue bubbles; here, narrative text states, “Now everybody get in line, let’s say it together one more time….” Upon the turn of the page, the animal dads gaze round-eyed as their young across the gutter all cry, “DADA!” (except the duckling, who says, “quack”). Ordóñez's illustrations have a bland, digital look, compositions hardly varying with the characters, although the pastel-colored backgrounds change. The punch line fails from a design standpoint, as the sudden, single-bubble chorus of “DADA” appears to be emanating from background features rather than the baby animals’ mouths (only some of which, on close inspection, appear to be open). It also fails to be funny.
Plotless and pointless, the book clearly exists only because its celebrity author wrote it. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: June 9, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-250-00934-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: April 14, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2015
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SEEN & HEARD
by George Shannon ; illustrated by Blanca Gómez ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 26, 2015
A visually striking, engaging picture book that sends the message that everyone counts.
A playful counting book also acts as a celebration of family and human diversity.
Shannon’s text is delivered in spare, rhythmic, lilting verse that begins with one and counts up to 10 as it presents different groupings of things and people in individual families, always emphasizing the unitary nature of each combination. “One is six. One line of laundry. One butterfly’s legs. One family.” Gomez’s richly colored pictures clarify and expand on all that the text lists: For “six,” a picture showing six members of a multigenerational family of color includes a line of laundry with six items hanging from it outside of their windows, as well as the painting of a six-legged butterfly that a child in the family is creating. While text never directs the art to depict diverse individuals and family constellations, Gomez does just this in her illustrations. Interracial families are included, as are depictions of men with their arms around each other, and a Sikh man wearing a turban. This inclusive spirit supports the text’s culminating assertion that “One is one and everyone. One earth. One world. One family.”
A visually striking, engaging picture book that sends the message that everyone counts. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: May 26, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-374-30003-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Frances Foster/Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2015
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