Extraordinary in craft and tender in feeling.
A Caldecott Honor winner charts the full arc of a cat’s life—and its owner’s love—in one of the most visually inventive picture books in recent memory.
Tamaki turns adjectives into an effective narrative engine. Most pages are anchored by a short phrase—“queenly cat,” “dreaming cat,” “ancient cat”—and the accumulation of these brief, precise descriptors traces an entire relationship from hopeful adoption to heartbreak. The protagonist, a dark-haired, dark-eyed, tan-skinned person whom we follow from childhood into young adulthood, ages alongside the feline. The art, created on stretched fabric including thrifted bedsheets, combines acrylic ink with crewel embroidery to lovely effect. Color does heavy lifting throughout: lime green indicating mischief (the naughty cat raiding the holiday table), warm yellows for the slowing days of old age, inky midnight blue for grief. The dream sequences are a particular triumph; the sleeping cat transforms into a lion roaring across a savanna, a tutu-clad ballerina partnered with a mouse, a great wave-riding sea creature—each fantastical form still recognizable because of those expressive embroidered eyes and that distinctive gray-and-white fur. The final spreads, depicting a small figure waving into vast cloudy blue as a star-spangled cat leaps through the cosmos, earn their quiet devastation before Tamaki brings her tale to a joyous conclusion, with the owner deciding to adopt a new pet.
Extraordinary in craft and tender in feeling. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2026
ISBN: 9780593694312
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2026
A hymn to the intrinsic loveliness of the wild and the possibility of sharing it.
What happens when a robot washes up alone on an island?
“Everything was just right on the island.” Brown beautifully re-creates the first days of Roz, the protagonist of his Wild Robot novels, as she adapts to living in the natural world. A storm-tossed ship, seen in the opening just before the title page, and a packing crate are the only other human-made objects to appear in this close-up look at the robot and her new home. Roz emerges from the crate, and her first thought as she sets off up a grassy hill—”This must be where I belong”—is sweetly glorious, a note of recognition rather than conquest. Roz learns to move, hide, and communicate like the creatures she meets. When she discovers an orphaned egg—and the gosling Brightbill, who eventually hatches—her decision to be his mother seems a natural extension of her adaptation. Once he flies south for the winter, her quiet wait across seasons for his return is a poignant portrayal of separation and change. Brown’s clean, precise lines and deep, light-filled colors offer a sense of what Roz might be seeing, suggesting a place that is alive yet deeply serene and radiant. Though the book stands alone, it adds an immensely appealing dimension to Roz’s world. Round thumbnails offer charming peeks into the island world, depicting Roz’s animal neighbors and Brightbill’s maturation.
A hymn to the intrinsic loveliness of the wild and the possibility of sharing it. (author’s note) (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: June 24, 2025
ISBN: 9780316669467
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: March 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2025
The runaway cookie in this Mexican bakery is a soft, brown, stubby-tailed piglet as impertinently bold and smug in his continual escape as his Gingerbread Boy cousin. “Chase me! Chase me down the street. But this is one piggy you won’t get to eat! / ¡Córrele, córrele! ¡Y Córrele más! ¡Soy el cochinito que jamás comerás!” This bouncy dual refrain extends the familiar cumulative text, rendered in both English and Spanish, as piggy manages to elude Marta the baker, Lorenzo the mechanic, Mamá Nita the beautician, Joaquín the telephone repairman and a host of other neighborhood adults—until he is outsmarted by Rosa, a little girl on her way to school, who foxily “helps him” cross the street. Safely tucked into her backpack, piggy is both a welcome surprise and an excuse for Rosa’s lateness to class. Deep opaque acrylic paintings of a colorful barrio and its residents in pursuit add the right amount of cultural flavor to this vivid Latino retelling. Recipe appended. (Picture book. 3-6)
Pub Date: Nov. 30, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-55885-586-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Piñata Books/Arte Público
Review Posted Online: Sept. 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2010
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
