Ghastly.
Left to wander on Mars after mission’s end, the lonely Curiosity rover makes some bizarre friends.
“Mission Control, don’t leave me here! There’s more to do….Hello?...Can you hear me?” Poor Curiosity, abandoned, has nothing to do but continue rolling over the sere landscape. Until, that is, he (explicitly gendered) falls into a crevasse, lands on a soft pile of leaves (!) and at last does find life on Mars—namely Sputnik (“Beeeeeep! Beeeep!”) and Laika the space dog (“Rufff! Ruff!”). Even readers obliging enough to roll with the story’s surreal elements (and unfamiliar with the real Laika’s ugly fate) will be left spinning their wheels by the garishly colored cartoon art. The rover, looking like a tearful mechanical turtle with clinical depression, may draw sympathy, but Sputnik resembles a spider with heavy, retro-style eyeglasses, and Laika is portrayed as a slobbery pooch in a space helmet with big, creepy, staring eyes. In the last scene, dog and satellite are seen playing Twister as their new playmate contentedly sits by, letting his radio batteries run down.
Ghastly. (author’s note) (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-62087-994-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sky Pony Press
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2013
Pure saccharine.
Images in clouds inspire memories.
Written in rhyming couplets, this love letter from a mother to her nearly grown daughter recounts the key moments of childhood that help define the personality of the girl. Each moment is inspired by the sight of clouds passing by overhead on the mother’s walk. Illustrations combine lush, painterly backgrounds representing the real world and cartoon drawings for the memories of childhood that the mother imagines within the clouds. The juxtaposition of styles draws readers’ eyes naturally to the imagined characters with paper-white skin and hair frolicking in the sky without detracting from the real-world representation of the White-presenting mother. The busy compositions may become muddled for large group storytimes but will function adequately with small groups and best with intimate lap reads. The text doesn’t keep pace with the stylized illustrations, the couplets often stumbling to rhyme as such combinations as home / alone or become / young are shoehorned together. Readers may wonder why this mother isn’t spreading the love to her sons, depicted in the memories. In fact, the audience for this nostalgic picture-book ode to the vanished childhood of a kid who is revealed to be a young teen is unclear. A gratuitous three-page endnote explaining the sincerity of the story is as effective as someone explaining why a joke is funny; it’s unnecessary icing on an already-too-sweet tale. (This book was reviewed digitally with 9-by-22-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Pure saccharine. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Oct. 27, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3953-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2020
A well-crafted, thoughtful, and well-illustrated addition to a noteworthy educational book series.
A well-traveled manatee guides young readers through an undersea journey in this lively, informational picture book.
Always up for exciting aquatic adventures, wise Kobee Manatee and his friends, Pablo the hermit crab and Tess the seahorse, leave the Cayman Islands for a roughly 500-mile swim to the Belize Barrier Reef. Their destination: the Seagrass Café, run by Kobee’s cousin, who needs help cleaning up plastic litter before she can host her guests. Off the coast of Belize, too, is the must-see Great Blue Hole, which Kobee tells his friends is “one of the most amazing places on Earth”; one of many “Kobee’s Fun Facts”—short, clearly written text boxes sprinkled liberally throughout the book—informs readers that “The Great Blue Hole is so deep that sunlight cannot reach its depths, and plants and plankton can’t survive.” Some other facts aren’t exactly “fun,” in that they observe the alarming issue of damage to ocean life due to climate change and massive dumping of plastics and other toxic waste. However, they do reflect careful research and also offer information for kids and families, such as a list of ocean-conservation organizations. These encapsulated asides give weight to the charm of Thayer’s storytelling and the colorful, cartoon-style characters courtesy of illustrator Gallegos; Kobee sports a purple cap and yellow vest, Tess has glamorous pink hair, and the depiction of life in the ocean effectively draws on both fact and fantasy. Fueled by themes of friendship, cooperation, and compassion, the trio’s eventful journey also doesn’t lack for excitement, either: Pablo uses his claws to free a sea turtle from bindings of plastic, the friends are nearly stung by a Portuguese man-of-war, and Kobee rescues Tess from a scorpionfish.
A well-crafted, thoughtful, and well-illustrated addition to a noteworthy educational book series.Pub Date: Sept. 28, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-99-712399-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Thompson Mill Press
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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