As the opening line says, “This story happened long, long ago, but that is all the more reason for telling it again, lest it...
A fresh version of Andersen’s tender tale is illustrated with delicate watercolors.
This retelling, first published in Switzerland (and with an uncredited translation), is straightforward, allowing the soft, muted artwork to accent the details and ambiance. When the Emperor of China hears there is a nightingale that sings beautiful songs in his garden and he’s never heard of it, he commands that the bird be brought to him to sing. The little gray bird’s singing brings tears to his eyes, and the Emperor declares that the bird must remain at court. So it does, until the day the Emperor of Japan sends a mechanical bird encrusted with jewels, claiming his is better. From then on the mechanical bird is favored and the real nightingale forgotten—until years later, when the Emperor buys on his deathbed and the precious bejeweled bird breaks. The little gray nightingale flies to him and sings, bringing him back to life. Vainio’s illustrations vary from double- and full-page spreads to small vignettes that help to break up the lengthy text blocks. The palette of light pastels elegantly captures the medieval Chinese setting and provides an effective background for the plain-colored bird with a beautiful voice.
As the opening line says, “This story happened long, long ago, but that is all the more reason for telling it again, lest it be forgotten. (Picture book/fairy tale. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-7358-4029-4
Page Count: 44
Publisher: NorthSouth
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
Emergent readers will like the humor in little Pip’s pointed requests, and more engaging adventures for Otto and Pip will be...
In his third beginning reader about Otto the robot, Milgrim (See Otto, 2002, etc.) introduces another new friend for Otto, a little mouse named Pip.
The simple plot involves a large balloon that Otto kindly shares with Pip after the mouse has a rather funny pointing attack. (Pip seems to be in that I-point-and-I-want-it phase common with one-year-olds.) The big purple balloon is large enough to carry Pip up and away over the clouds, until Pip runs into Zee the bee. (“Oops, there goes Pip.”) Otto flies a plane up to rescue Pip (“Hurry, Otto, Hurry”), but they crash (and splash) in front of some hippos with another big balloon, and the story ends as it begins, with a droll “See Pip point.” Milgrim again succeeds in the difficult challenge of creating a real, funny story with just a few simple words. His illustrations utilize lots of motion and basic geometric shapes with heavy black outlines, all against pastel backgrounds with text set in an extra-large typeface.
Emergent readers will like the humor in little Pip’s pointed requests, and more engaging adventures for Otto and Pip will be welcome additions to the limited selection of funny stories for children just beginning to read. (Easy reader. 5-7)Pub Date: March 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-689-85116-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2003
Pretty, though as condensations go, less Wonder-full than Robert Sabuda’s pop-up Alice (2003) or the digital Alicewinks...
A much-abridged version of the classic’s first five chapters, dressed up with large and properly surreal illustrations.
Rhatigan and Nurnberg retain “Curiouser and curiouser!” and other select bits of the original while recasting the narrative in various sizes of type and a modern-sounding idiom: “Tiny Alice needed something special to eat to get back to her regular girl size.” They take Carroll’s bemused young explorer past initial ups and downs and her encounter with a certain (here, nonsmoking) Blue Caterpillar. Looking more to Disney than Tenniel, Puybaret casts Alice as a slender figure with flyaway corn-silk hair and big, blue, widely spaced eyes posing with balletic grace against broadly airbrushed backdrops. Leafless trees and barren hills give Wonderland an open, autumnal look. The odd vegetation adds an otherworldly tone, and compact houses and residents from the White Rabbit and the Dodo to occasional troupes of mice or other small creatures in circus dress are depicted with precise, lapidary polish. A marginally relevant endpaper map (partly blocked by the flaps) leads down the River of Tears, past a turnoff for a Bathroom and on toward “the Tea Party.”
Pretty, though as condensations go, less Wonder-full than Robert Sabuda’s pop-up Alice (2003) or the digital Alicewinks (2013). (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Feb. 24, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-62354-049-4
Page Count: 28
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
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