The irrepressible young storyteller introduced in Pinky Dinky Doo: Where Are My Shoes? (2004) returns with another wildly improbably yarn, this one featuring a truly epic Bad Hair Day. Finding her little brother Tyler cowering under a pile of laundry, Pinky charges him up for his first day of first grade with an account of how she, her friends Nicholas Biscuit and Daffinee Toilette, and even her teacher Ms. Mazanga and Principal Dipthong [sic] found a way to make the best of things one Class Picture Day despite ’dos that ranged from cat-fight tangled to downright quadrilateral. As before, Jinkins slips in some painless pedagogy—mostly such useful new vocabulary as “apprehensive” and “mph”—and illustrates this schoolroom saga with childlike cartoons mixed with or superimposed on color photos. Will this outing too have young readers rolling in the aisles? As Pinky would (does) say, “Yesserooni Positooni!” (Easy reader. 6-8)
Pub Date: July 12, 2005
ISBN: 0-375-83236-X
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2005
Categories: CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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As atmospheric as its companion, Twilight Comes Twice, this tone poem pairs poetically intense writing with luminescent oils featuring widely spaced houses, open lawns, and clumps of autumnal trees, all lit by a huge full moon. Fletcher tracks that moon’s nocturnal path in language rich in metaphor: “With silent slippers / it climbs the night stairs,” “staining earth and sky with a ghostly glow,” lighting up a child’s bedroom, the wings of a small plane, moonflowers, and, ranging further afield, harbor waves and the shells of turtle hatchlings on a beach. Using creamy brushwork and subtly muted colors, Kiesler depicts each landscape, each night creature from Luna moths to a sleepless child and her cat, as well as the great moon sweeping across star-flecked skies, from varied but never vertiginous angles. Closing with moonset, as dawn illuminates the world with a different kind of light, this makes peaceful reading either in season, or on any moonlit night. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2003
ISBN: 0-618-16451-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2003
Categories: CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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Epistolary dispatches from the eternal canine/feline feud.
Simon the cat is angry. He had done a good job taking care of his boy, Andy, but now that Andy’s parents are divorced, a dog named Baxter has moved into Andy’s dad’s house. Simon believes that there isn’t enough room in Andy’s life for two furry friends, so he uses the power of the pen to get Baxter to move out. Inventively for the early-chapter-book format, the story is told in letters written back and forth; Simon’s are impeccably spelled on personalized stationery while Baxter’s spelling slowly improves through the letters he scrawls on scraps of paper. A few other animals make appearances—a puffy-lipped goldfish who for some reason punctuates her letter with “Blub…blub…” seems to be the only female character (cued through stereotypical use of eyelashes and red lipstick), and a mustachioed snail ferries the mail to and fro. White-appearing Andy is seen playing with both animals as a visual background to the text, as is his friend Noah (a dark-skinned child who perhaps should not be nicknamed “N Man”). Cat lovers will appreciate Simon’s prickliness while dog aficionados will likely enjoy Baxter’s obtuse enthusiasm, and all readers will learn about the time and patience it takes to overcome conflict and jealousy with someone you dislike.
An effective early chapter book conveyed in a slightly overdone gag. (Fiction. 6-8)Pub Date: May 12, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-8234-4492-2
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Jan. 21, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2020
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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