A polished debut for this British author/illustrator, who might invent more challenges for the newly minimalist Lulu.
Little Lulu finds a creative way to clear out her huge collection of toys.
Lulu has a favorite toy, a golden teddy bear she calls Jupiter, who has been her best friend since she was a baby. He is always by Lulu’s side, playing with her and helping her. Lulu receives more and more toys as she gets older, and by Christmas when she is 5, she is inundated with far too many possessions. Her bedroom is wall-to-wall toys, and there is no longer any room for Jupiter in her bed. Lulu solves her own problem by putting together a “Great Toy Giveaway.” She invites all her friends and gives all her toys away, except for her bear, the only toy she really needs. This calm, well-paced story shows the disadvantages of too much of a good thing as well as the importance of one special toy or friend with great meaning. In her first book, Deedman shows a strong sense of style with her children and toy characters. Her mixed-media illustrations have a 1920s-style flavor, and Lulu has the bobbed hair and simple, plaid dress of that era, though one of her toys is a robot. Lulu and her friends are all Caucasian, with the possible exception of a dark-skinned, curly-haired boy who attends her birthday party and comes to her sale.
A polished debut for this British author/illustrator, who might invent more challenges for the newly minimalist Lulu. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-7636-7861-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2015
High-quality, inclusive illustrations make this one stand out.
From the changing season to decorations and costumes, children anticipate Halloween.
Little readers will enjoy all of the familiar markers of the season included in this book: falling leaves, jack-o’-lanterns, Halloween costumes, candy, and trick-or-treating. Everett’s rhyming couplets bob along safely, offering nothing that will wow but enough to keep the pages turning. It’s Wen’s illustrations that give the most to readers, full of bustling scenes and lovely details. A double-page spread of the children in town in front of the candy store includes jars with individually drawn treats and other festive delicacies. The townwide celebration features instruments, creative costumes, and a diverse crowd of people. There are three children who appear as the focus of the illustrations, though there are many secondary characters. One bespectacled White child is drawn in a manual wheelchair, another has dark brown skin, the third presents Asian. The child in the wheelchair is shown as a full participant. Readers will enjoy spotting spooks like a vampire, goblin, and werewolf, as they sometimes appear in the background and other times blend in with the crowd. The familiar trappings of Halloween paired with the robust illustrations will have little readers wanting to reread even if the content itself is not startlingly new.
High-quality, inclusive illustrations make this one stand out. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7282-0586-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2021
As ephemeral as a valentine.
Daywalt and Jeffers’ wandering crayons explore love.
Each double-page spread offers readers a vision of one of the anthropomorphic crayons on the left along with the statement “Love is [color].” The word love is represented by a small heart in the appropriate color. Opposite, childlike crayon drawings explain how that color represents love. So, readers learn, “love is green. / Because love is helpful.” The accompanying crayon drawing depicts two alligators, one holding a recycling bin and the other tossing a plastic cup into it, offering readers two ways of understanding green. Some statements are thought-provoking: “Love is white. / Because sometimes love is hard to see,” reaches beyond the immediate image of a cat’s yellow eyes, pink nose, and black mouth and whiskers, its white face and body indistinguishable from the paper it’s drawn on, to prompt real questions. “Love is brown. / Because sometimes love stinks,” on the other hand, depicted by a brown bear standing next to a brown, squiggly turd, may provoke giggles but is fundamentally a cheap laugh. Some of the color assignments have a distinctly arbitrary feel: Why is purple associated with the imagination and pink with silliness? Fans of The Day the Crayons Quit (2013) hoping for more clever, metaliterary fun will be disappointed by this rather syrupy read.
As ephemeral as a valentine. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Dec. 24, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5247-9268-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
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