A classroom filled with personified stars teaches readers a few facts about space and about being special. When Ms. Sun tells her Sky School class that each of them will get a turn to be the Star of the Week, they are all excited, but none more so than Twinkle. Looking forward to Sharing Time, she plans to share her special song. The other stars share such things as asteroid cookies, a pet Comet and the game of Constellation Tag, and all the while Twinkle practices her song. But then Blink sings the song she thought was hers alone. Can she find something special to share in the time remaining? Is there any doubt? In the nick of time someone uses her as a wishing star, and she helps them make their wish come true. Nicholls’s digital artwork gives each star his/her own personality, but his renderings hew to the obvious, picturing the students with oversized, five-pointed stars for heads. While Holub’s concept of a wishing star is a great one, it comes too close to the end to support the lackluster story that comes before it. Perhaps her next will further build upon that conceit. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: March 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-8075-8131-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Whitman
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses.
An NBA star pays tribute to the influence of his grandfather.
In the same vein as his Long Shot (2009), illustrated by Frank Morrison, this latest from Paul prioritizes values and character: “My granddad Papa Chilly had dreams that came true,” he writes, “so maybe if I listen and watch him, / mine will too.” So it is that the wide-eyed Black child in the simply drawn illustrations rises early to get to the playground hoops before anyone else, watches his elder working hard and respecting others, hears him cheering along with the rest of the family from the stands during games, and recalls in a prose afterword that his grandfather wasn’t one to lecture but taught by example. Paul mentions in both the text and the backmatter that Papa Chilly was the first African American to own a service station in North Carolina (his presumed dream) but not that he was killed in a robbery, which has the effect of keeping the overall tone positive and the instructional content one-dimensional. Figures in the pictures are mostly dark-skinned. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-250-81003-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
It’s a slam dunk
Lucy discovers that the way to learn to play basketball is with friends on a neighborhood court.
Lucy loves playing in the park, and one day she and her friends join their friend Ava and her cousin in their new favorite sport: basketball. Pro player Jermaine, aka “Coach J,” teaches all the basics—footwork, quick passes, dribbling, and a variety of shots. But he also encourages the players to keep trying when they miss, stresses the value of teamwork, and focuses on fun as they learn and later play a practice game. At the end of the workout, Coach J invites the young players to watch him and his team play. Written in loose rhyming couplets, the text has many near rhymes and inconsistent meter. While the storyline is predictable, the book is a good introduction to basketball terms, and young basketball players and fans will appreciate reading about themselves. Vivid silhouetted figures against a white background portray male and female players of several races; Lucy herself is white while Ava and Coach J are black. One young player competes from a wheelchair. A half page of backmatter explains the history of basketball, the NBA and its players, and wheelchair basketball, and one entry also explains the three-on-three basketball that the children play. The book publishes in a simultaneous French edition translated by Rachel Martinez.
It’s a slam dunk . (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4598-1697-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Orca
Review Posted Online: May 7, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2019
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