A simple, colorful book that will likely make excellent bedtime reading.
A sweet, lushly illustrated book about a mother bird’s unconditional love for her baby.
Monroe’s debut picture book, in the vein of Sam McBratney’s Guess How Much I Love You (1994), tells the story of a baby bird who asks his mother a series of hypotheticals about how much she loves him. “[W]hat if I roll in the dirt and get mud all over my face and feathers?” he asks, among other similar questions. The mother, of course, reassures the chick repeatedly. When a crisis occurs later in the story and the flock nearly leaves the baby behind, his mother comes through and protects him, proving that she will always love him no matter what. (The conflict is quite minimal, and doesn’t last long enough to frighten smaller children.) Children will likely enjoy reading this book along with a caregiver, and the question-and-answer format makes for a good interactive bedtime story. The illustrations are lovely, with the birds portrayed realistically rather than cartoonishly; the backgrounds have a charming, sketchy quality that calls to mind magazine illustrations of the 1950s and ’60s, and they include small details that may delight younger children. Illustrator Whittaker-Paek conveys motion with vibrant lines uses colors that make the birds appear fluffy and warm. Some of the language is a bit formal for a children’s book; when the mother bird answers her baby’s questions, he is “pleased with his mother’s reply” and “liked his mother’s response,” rather than simply being happy with her answer. However, the prose will introduce small children to longer words and synonyms and won’t detract from a pleasurable reading experience.
A simple, colorful book that will likely make excellent bedtime reading.Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2013
ISBN: 978-0615672571
Page Count: 28
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 23, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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