What hath Bettelheim wrought? We have here an old blind gypsy and the tales she spins for passers-by—seven stories of a mythic, usually sexual, nature, each tailored to its purchaser, all of them symbolizations of their situations, none of them construable on any other level. In the most mundane sense, it's as if Aesop were telling the story of the fox and the grapes to an envious soul. Thus, a cold, imperious husband is presented with "Man of Rock, Man of Stone" in which a quarrier, angered by his wife's insistent wish for a child (after their wedding: "Will we make a child tonight?"), tries to make a child of stone; but, unaccustomed to looking at children, he makes a man in his own image—which, taking fright, slays him. This is followed by "The Tree's Wife"—told to a sad young woman in black and her little son—wherein a rich young widow, rejecting her fortune-hunting suitors, declares she'd "sooner wed this tree," sees it turn into a man of birch, couples with him ("When his mouth came down on hers, she smelled the damp woody odor of his breath"), bears a child—and, after the tree dies (going, futilely, for a midwife), is lifted skyward with her child by the nearest birch. Says the widowed dream-buyer to her child: "Come. We will go to your father's people. They will take us in, I know that now." The framing device is hokey, the tales are realtively trite (but sententiously delivered) embodiments of classic motifs, the reader can only take them or leave them—not ponder their meaning for himself/herself. And goodness knows there's little to delight in.
Pub Date: April 1, 1979
ISBN: 0529055171
Page Count: 88
Publisher: Collins
Review Posted Online: May 11, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1979
The greening of Dr. Seuss, in an ecology fable with an obvious message but a savingly silly style. In the desolate land of the Lifted Lorax, an aged creature called the Once-ler tells a young visitor how he arrived long ago in the then glorious country and began manufacturing anomalous objects called Thneeds from "the bright-colored tufts of the Truffula Trees." Despite protests from the Lorax, a native "who speaks for the trees," he continues to chop down Truffulas until he drives away the Brown Bar-ba-loots who had fed on the Tuffula fruit, the Swomee-Swans who can't sing a note for the smogulous smoke, and the Humming-Fish who had hummed in the pond now glumped up with Gluppity-Glupp. As for the Once-let, "1 went right on biggering, selling more Thneeds./ And I biggered my money, which everyone needs" — until the last Truffula falls. But one seed is left, and the Once-let hands it to his listener, with a message from the Lorax: "UNLESS someone like you/ cares a whole awful lot,/ nothing is going to get better./ It's not." The spontaneous madness of the old Dr. Seuss is absent here, but so is the boredom he often induced (in parents, anyway) with one ridiculous invention after another. And if the Once-let doesn't match the Grinch for sheer irresistible cussedness, he is stealing a lot more than Christmas and his story just might induce a generation of six-year-olds to care a whole lot.
Pub Date: Aug. 12, 1971
ISBN: 0394823370
Page Count: 72
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Oct. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1971
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A fast and funny alternative to the Wimpy Kid.
Black sixth-grader Jake Liston can only play one song on the piano. He can’t read music very well, and he can’t improvise. So how did Jake get accepted to the Music and Art Academy? He faked it.
Alongside an eclectic group of academy classmates, and with advice from his best friend, Jake tries to fit in at a school where things like garbage sculpting and writing art reviews of bird poop splatter are the norm. All is well until Jake discovers that the end-of-the-semester talent show is only two weeks away, and Jake is short one very important thing…talent. Or is he? It’s up to Jake to either find the talent that lies within or embarrass himself in front of the entire school. Light and humorous, with Knight’s illustrations adding to the fun, Jake’s story will likely appeal to many middle-grade readers, especially those who might otherwise be reluctant to pick up a book. While the artsy antics may be over-the-top at times, this is a story about something that most preteens can relate to: the struggle to find your authentic self. And in a world filled with books about wanting to fit in with the athletically gifted supercliques, this novel unabashedly celebrates the artsy crowd in all of its quirky, creative glory.
A fast and funny alternative to the Wimpy Kid. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: March 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-553-52351-5
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2016
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