This essentially wordless (“Good night, Garden Gnome” is the full extent of text) picture book spices its simple flavor of fantasy with the ever-so-uneasy strangeness radiated by an ordinary garden gnome. The story opens with a young girl squiring her dolls and stuffed animals about the yard in a red wagon. One of the characters in the wagon is a garden gnome of the long-beard-and-Alpine-garb persuasion. It is his vacant stare that gives off the spooky edge, though he seems a jolly enough sort and no stiffer or less lifelike than the others. When it is time for the girl to go in for the night, she leaves the gnome outside, at which point he comes to life—eyes still vacant—to do his evening’s work. Here he’s much more accomplished than the creature she’s dumped into the birdbath or dressed up in doll clothes. He’s guarding the garden against slugs, helping to feed the rabbits and birds, warding off the cat, communing with the mice and turtles as the sun rises. Then he returns to the little girl one of the stuffed animals left behind the night before. There is even a little bit of adventure when a dog almost buries the gnome, but all comes out right in this gentle salute to the imagination, elegantly caught from the gnome’s-eye view in the saturated colors of the evening. Who knew they had it in them? (Picture book. 3-5)
Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-8037-2531-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2001
Moderately inspired but tired all the same.
Pizzoli’s young cat, Templeton, gets what he wishes for, with predictable results.
Templeton is the eldest kitten in the house, so he is the beneficiary of all the usual stuff: demanding parents—“Scrub harder, Templeton!” “Clean up this mess!”—and a trio of brothers who take his favorite toys. He comes across an advertisement in a comic book for a magic diamond that grants wishes. “So he did something bad”—robbing a brother’s piggy bank—“and got something good in return.” That’s some rough philosophical ground, though it is also the most original—if disturbing—turf turned in this otherwise foreseeable tale. Templeton wishes his family gone; they disappear; he revels: playing, singing, lounging, making a mess of the house and himself. No more demands, no more sharing. Then things get boring, scary at night, stinky, and lonely. He wishes his family back, and back they come, same as they ever were, which is fine with Templeton: same demands, same sharing. Pizzoli brings extremely simple language to the task, and so too for the artwork, though here the complementary colors set eyeballs vibrating, and Templeton radiates a hepcat appeal. But the piggy-bank heist never gets revisited, ill wishes don’t get explored, and no twist gives the old story some fresh air.
Moderately inspired but tired all the same. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: May 12, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4847-1274-0
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2015
Most young readers, even those in diapers, would agree.
As if the fiery disaster of the first outing (2012) weren’t bad enough, news that the world’s entire supply of tacos has been used up leaves not just the dragons dismayed.
Fortunately, there’s a time machine in the garage, so it might be possible to bring new seed stock for taco trees (didn’t you know?) from the past. Unfortunately, said device is hard to calibrate— first they undershoot back to the previous volume’s spicy-salsa–fueled holocaust and then overshoot to a similar catastrophe in prehistoric times. Subsequent ventures into alternate space-time continua lead to universes where dragons love…diapers (“That’s not right”), and tacos chow down on dragons (“Weird, but closer!”). Then, when the chunky white lad leading the draconic expedition does finally get it right, only the taco in his lap survives the trip back to the present. That’s enough for a happy ending, though, as Salmieri shows in the last of his naïve-style cartoon scenes with a taco party in which dragons and diversely hued figures (some recognizable) from various historical and fantasy realms mingle. “After all,” as Rubin puts it, “dragons love diapers. I mean, tacos. Dragons love tacos. / Heck, everyone loves tacos.”
Most young readers, even those in diapers, would agree. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: May 2, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-525-42888-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2017
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