A package in the mail helps a baby penguin know that his mother loves him even though miles separate them.
Kipling’s Mama has to go on a trip (where and why are never explained), and he misses her, especially at dinner and at bedtime. The next morning, he tries some clever surrogates, “But Pillow Mama wouldn’t read, / Picture Mama wouldn’t laugh… // …and Snow Mama was too cold to cuddle.” (Pillow Mama is a square cushion with glasses that look like Mama’s perched on top.) And though Kipling wishes for Mama on each of his wishing rocks, all he gets is a soggy box—but it’s from Mama! It contains treasures for Kipling as well as a paper heart expressing Mama’s love and a picture of her hugging that heart. Kipling immediately sets out to make Mama her own care package, and before he knows it, she’s back, his package tucked under her wing. Roly-poly Kipling belongs to a family of chinstrap penguins. All the animals are anthropomorphized, from the penguins’ house and Kipling’s red boots to all the species—Arctic terns, pelicans, whales, and seals—that are involved in delivering the packages (some even punch a time clock!). The artwork works with the spare text to keep the focus on how Kipling is feeling; readers are sure to empathize.
This will provide both reassurance to children missing their own loved ones and ideas for staying connected. (Picture book. 3-8)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-62672-949-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Roaring Brook
Review Posted Online: Oct. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2017
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
12
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The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 29, 2018
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS
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BOOK REVIEW
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From an artist, poet, and Instagram celebrity, a pep talk for all who question where a new road might lead.
Opening by asking readers, “Have you ever wanted to go in a different direction,” the unnamed narrator describes having such a feeling and then witnessing the appearance of a new road “almost as if it were magic.” “Where do you lead?” the narrator asks. The Road’s twice-iterated response—“Be a leader and find out”—bookends a dialogue in which a traveler’s anxieties are answered by platitudes. “What if I fall?” worries the narrator in a stylized, faux hand-lettered type Wade’s Instagram followers will recognize. The Road’s dialogue and the narration are set in a chunky, sans-serif type with no quotation marks, so the one flows into the other confusingly. “Everyone falls at some point, said the Road. / But I will always be there when you land.” Narrator: “What if the world around us is filled with hate?” Road: “Lead it to love.” Narrator: “What if I feel stuck?” Road: “Keep going.” De Moyencourt illustrates this colloquy with luminous scenes of a small, brown-skinned child, face turned away from viewers so all they see is a mop of blond curls. The child steps into an urban mural, walks along a winding country road through broad rural landscapes and scary woods, climbs a rugged metaphorical mountain, then comes to stand at last, Little Prince–like, on a tiny blue and green planet. Wade’s closing claim that her message isn’t meant just for children is likely superfluous…in fact, forget the just.
Inspiration, shrink wrapped. (Picture book. 6-8, adult)Pub Date: March 23, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-26949-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: April 8, 2021
Categories: CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES
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