Holub (Scat, Cats!, above, etc.) uses a rhyming, patterned text to follow a group of five young children experiencing the growth cycle with pumpkins, from planting seeds all the way through to jack-o’-lanterns, pumpkin bread, and seeds saved for next year’s garden. The simple text at the 2.4 level uses a “this is the —” pattern throughout, with rhyming couplets that encourage prediction of closing words. The sequential storyline covers both the necessary elements of nature (tilled soil, water, sun, worms, and bees) and the work by gardeners required for growing healthy plants. Nakata’s (Lucky Pennies and Hot Chocolate, 2000) cheerful watercolors of round-headed children are charming and generally complement the text, but the color palate is not as bright as it should be to reflect the vibrant, bouncy rhymes, especially for a title that will be used for reading to a group, as well as by individual readers. Nonetheless, easy nonfiction titles about seed cycles are always in demand for first- and second-grade science lessons, and Holub’s story will also be used for preschool or kindergarten story hours in October, when pumpkin stories are as popular as full-sized candy bars on Halloween night. (Easy reader/nonfiction. 5-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-670-89799-X
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2001
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BOOK REVIEW
The wriggly narrator of Diary of a Worm (2003) puts in occasional appearances, but it’s his arachnid buddy who takes center stage here, with terse, tongue-in-cheek comments on his likes (his close friend Fly, Charlotte’s Web), his dislikes (vacuums, people with big feet), nervous encounters with a huge Daddy Longlegs, his extended family—which includes a Grandpa more than willing to share hard-won wisdom (The secret to a long, happy life: “Never fall asleep in a shoe.”)—and mishaps both at spider school and on the human playground. Bliss endows his garden-dwellers with faces and the odd hat or other accessory, and creates cozy webs or burrows colorfully decorated with corks, scraps, plastic toys and other human detritus. Spider closes with the notion that we could all get along, “just like me and Fly,” if we but got to know one another. Once again, brilliantly hilarious. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-06-000153-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Joanna Cotler/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2005
Hee haw.
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. 28, 2018
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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