An absolute delight, featuring a quirky, resourceful doll heroine.
In Hébert’s illustrated debut children’s book, a cloth doll with a special gold monocle, watch, and bustle gets lost and goes on adventures.
Elsie’s mother made a doll named Maesee Peek from scraps of tapestry and lace, giving her a Victorian bustle and big purple hair. (She got her name because Elsie kept asking, “May I see? Just a peek” during the doll’s construction.) Elsie’s father added some important touches, including a gold monocle so that Maesee “will always see where to go,” and a gold watch on a chain so she’ll “always know when it is time to come home.” Elsie adores Maesee and is never without her—until the day she accidentally leaves the doll behind after an outdoor picnic. Maesee tumbles onto the muddy bank of a pond lined with cattails, and after several twists and turns, she gets loaded onto a ship filled with art and precious objects and sent across the sea. A storm arises and the ship’s contents go overboard, but luckily, Elsie’s clever mother crafted Maesee’s bustle from Elsie’s worn-out flotation device, and the doll floats long enough to be picked up by a sea gull and then found by two little girls vacationing in an Irish castle. Hébert offers an appealing heroine and dramatic plot twists and vividly renders such moments as when the container ship full of artwork gets subsumed into the ocean. Especially pleasing is the narrator, who respects children’s intelligence; for example, when seawater drifts into her monocle, Maesee thinks they’re “Sneaky little creatures coming here to hide before the menu recommends a delicious assortment of zooplankton.” Historical information enriches the story, as when the leprechaun-ish concierge comments on Irish lace: “The patterns were carefully guarded secrets passed along only to the daughters of the original women artists who created them. We are extremely proud of the collection.” Lemaire’s illustrations ably capture the book’s magical, one-of-a-kind spirit.
An absolute delight, featuring a quirky, resourceful doll heroine.Pub Date: March 10, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4602-6765-3
Page Count: 36
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift.
A paean to teachers and their surrogates everywhere.
This gentle ode to a teacher’s skill at inspiring, encouraging, and being a role model is spoken, presumably, from a child’s viewpoint. However, the voice could equally be that of an adult, because who can’t look back upon teachers or other early mentors who gave of themselves and offered their pupils so much? Indeed, some of the self-aware, self-assured expressions herein seem perhaps more realistic as uttered from one who’s already grown. Alternatively, readers won’t fail to note that this small book, illustrated with gentle soy-ink drawings and featuring an adult-child bear duo engaged in various sedentary and lively pursuits, could just as easily be about human parent- (or grandparent-) child pairs: some of the softly colored illustrations depict scenarios that are more likely to occur within a home and/or other family-oriented setting. Makes sense: aren’t parents and other close family members children’s first teachers? This duality suggests that the book might be best shared one-on-one between a nostalgic adult and a child who’s developed some self-confidence, having learned a thing or two from a parent, grandparent, older relative, or classroom instructor.
A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-943200-08-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Compendium
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
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