A charming true story that captures the connection between people and nature through gorgeous images and an engaging...
An illustrated children’s story about how author/illustrator Williams and her husband taught a duckling to rejoin its peers, based on her previous account, which was aimed at an adult audience (Super Duck: A True Story, 1986).
The story begins with the narrator duckling’s parents looking for a place to hatch their eggs. They choose a boathouse owned by Jane and Don, who soon become central figures in the young duck’s life. (Williams describes the mother duck’s egg gestation in scientific terms but without it ever feeling too technical.) When the duckling begins to crack out of her shell, she pecks the shell so hard it rolls from the nest. Exhausted, she falls asleep midhatching; when she wakes, her mother and siblings are already gone. Luckily, Jane finds her, and Don helps her break through the rest of her tough shell; they become the duckling’s new parents. They name her “Super Duck” and eventually help her get free of a piece of shell that’s still stuck to her wing, days after hatching. Her early days are quite domestic, complete with a teddy bear and human cuddles, but Jane and Don soon start transitioning Super Duck to the outdoors. They protect her from predators but also try to introduce her to the local duck population. As Super Duck learns the things that normal ducks do, so do readers, and although children may like to imagine that Super Duck would stay with Jane and Don, they’ll also cheer when she starts to live the life of a normal duck in the wild. Williams’ black-and-white illustrations are wonderfully realistic, and the choice of the duck as the narrator gives this naturalist’s story a more childlike voice. Budding nature lovers may also find this book to be an effective bridge to other titles about animal rescue and bird rehabilitation.
A charming true story that captures the connection between people and nature through gorgeous images and an engaging narrative voice.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4808-3478-1
Page Count: -
Publisher: Archway Publishing
Review Posted Online: March 17, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.
A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.
Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come.
Little Blue Truck and his pal Toad meet friends old and new on a springtime drive through the country.
This lift-the-flap, interactive entry in the popular Little Blue Truck series lacks the narrative strength and valuable life lessons of the original Little Blue Truck (2008) and its sequel, Little Blue Truck Leads the Way (2009). Both of those books, published for preschoolers rather than toddlers, featured rich storylines, dramatic, kinetic illustrations, and simple but valuable life lessons—the folly of taking oneself too seriously, the importance of friends, and the virtue of taking turns, for example. At about half the length and with half as much text as the aforementioned titles, this volume is a much quicker read. Less a story than a vernal celebration, the book depicts a bucolic drive through farmland and encounters with various animals and their young along the way. Beautifully rendered two-page tableaux teem with butterflies, blossoms, and vibrant pastel, springtime colors. Little Blue greets a sheep standing in the door of a barn: “Yoo-hoo, Sheep! / Beep-beep! / What’s new?” Folding back the durable, card-stock flap reveals the barn’s interior and an adorable set of twin lambs. Encounters with a duck and nine ducklings, a cow with a calf, a pig with 10 (!) piglets, a family of bunnies, and a chicken with a freshly hatched chick provide ample opportunity for counting and vocabulary work.
Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come. (Board book. 1-4)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-544-93809-0
Page Count: 16
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
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