TADPOLE'S PROMISE

Name: TADPOLE'S PROMISE
Author: Jeanne Willis
ISBN: 0-689-86524-4

by Jeanne Willis ; illustrated by Tony Ross ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 1, 2005

The setup being perfect enough to leave even adult readers unsettled, this makes a promising addition to the “share if you...

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In this deceptively innocuous love story, a caterpillar and a polliwog pledge their love, promising each other that they will never change.

Fat chance, obviously: Each time they reunite, polliwog has grown new limbs. When he loses his tail, the caterpillar declares her heart is broken and huffs off to nurse her sorrows in a cocoon. Ross illustrates this economically told tale with equally sketchy watercolors, creating a serene natural setting, but turning it sideways so that the gutter becomes the boundary between land and water, and keeping background detail to a minimum to maintain visual focus on the rainbow-hued caterpillar and her “shiny black pearl.” In the end, she emerges rather different in form herself, but when she repentantly flutters down to a certain frog at the water’s edge, the romance comes to an abrupt and fatal end.

The setup being perfect enough to leave even adult readers unsettled, this makes a promising addition to the “share if you dare” list, next to, say, Chris Raschka’s Arlene Sardine (1998). (Picture book. 6-8)

Pub Date: June 1, 2005

ISBN: 0-689-86524-4

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Atheneum

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2005

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS

- BOOK REVIEW
SOFT AND STICKY
by Jeanne Willis ; illustrated by Claire Powell

- BOOK REVIEW
THE BEAR WHO HAD NOTHING TO WEAR
by Jeanne Willis ; illustrated by Brian Fitzgerald

- BOOK REVIEW
WHAT ARE LITTLE GIRLS MADE OF?
by Jeanne Willis ; illustrated by Isabelle Follath

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HENRY AND MUDGE AND THE STARRY NIGHT

From the Henry and Mudge series

by Cynthia Rylant & illustrated by Sucie Stevenson ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1998

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Rylant (Henry and Mudge and the Sneaky Crackers, 1998, etc.) slips into a sentimental mode for this latest outing of the boy and his dog, as she sends Mudge and Henry and his parents off on a camping trip. Each character is attended to, each personality sketched in a few brief words: Henry's mother is the camping veteran with outdoor savvy; Henry's father doesn't know a tent stake from a marshmallow fork, but he's got a guitar for campfire entertainment; and the principals are their usual ready-for-fun selves. There are sappy moments, e.g., after an evening of star- gazing, Rylant sends the family off to bed with: ``Everyone slept safe and sound and there were no bears, no scares. Just the clean smell of trees . . . and wonderful green dreams.'' With its nice tempo, the story is as toasty as its campfire and swaddled in Stevenson's trusty artwork. (Fiction. 6-8)

Pub Date: April 1, 1998

ISBN: 0-689-81175-6

Page Count: 48

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1998

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS

- BOOK REVIEW
A BOOK OF LOVES
by Cynthia Rylant ; illustrated by Cynthia Rylant

- BOOK REVIEW
HORNBEAM BY AND LARGE
by Cynthia Rylant ; illustrated by Arthur Howard

- BOOK REVIEW
HORNBEAM GETS IT DONE
by Cynthia Rylant ; illustrated by Arthur Howard

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BIG CHICKENS

by Leslie Helakoski & illustrated by Henry Cole ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 2006

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With wordplay reminiscent of Margie Palatini at her best, Helakoski takes four timorous chickens into, then out of, the literal and figurative woods. Fleeing the henhouse after catching sight of a wolf, the pusillanimous pullets come to a deep ditch: “ ‘What if we can’t jump that far?’ ‘What if we fall in the ditch?’ ‘What if we get sucked into the mud?’ The chickens tutted, putted, and flutted. They butted into themselves and each other, until one by one . . . ” they do fall in. But then they pick themselves up and struggle out. Ensuing encounters with cows and a lake furnish similar responses and outcomes; ultimately they tumble into the wolf’s very cave, where they “picked, pecked, and pocked. They ruffled, puffled, and shuffled. They shrieked, squeaked, and freaked, until . . . ” their nemesis scampers away in panic. Fluttering about in pop-eyed terror, the portly, partly clothed hens make comical figures in Cole’s sunny cartoons (as does the flummoxed wolf)—but the genuine triumph in their final strut—“ ‘I am a big, brave chicken,’ said one chicken. ‘Ohh . . . ’ said the others. ‘Me too.’ ‘Me three.’ ‘Me four’ ”—brings this tribute to chicken power to a rousing close. (Picture book. 6-8)