A blooming tale of teamwork and community.
At the Grand Bug Hotel, blooming flowers must be pollinated to reap a crop of fruits and vegetables for everyone to enjoy at the Garden Party.
Queen Bee has terrible allergies, and her sneezing is preventing her from orchestrating the annual pollination event. Flicker, an earnest and helpful firefly, offers to coordinate the effort and begins to enlist her fellow bugs. Everyone, however, seems uninterested or is too busy. Roly Poly would rather practice ninja kicks, while Dazzle, a butterfly, is too involved in tinkering with an invention. Flicker launches into a quick plea about the necessity of pollination for the plants to produce good food, and her friends quickly agree to share the hard, messy work of pollination while singing a work song. The story arc’s conflict and resolution are depicted in bright, bold spring colors in scenes of a vibrant garden infused with golden yellow clusters of pollen. While Queen Bee gives a very loose explanation of the scientific concept—“Every year, the bugs and butterflies must gather pollen from the flowers…and carry it to the fruit and vegetable plants in the garden”—the book lacks backmatter with more information on pollinators. Still, overall, it’s a rousing and upbeat tale of cooperation that also sheds some light on a scientific process. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A blooming tale of teamwork and community. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-8075-2517-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Whitman
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2022
A shining affirmation of Chinese American identity.
An immigrant couple’s empowering love letter to their child.
Baby Mei rests in her parents’ embrace, flanked by Chinese architecture on one side and the New York skyline on the other. She will be a bridge across the “oceans and worlds and cultures” that separate her parents from their homeland, China. Mei—a Chinese word which means beautiful—shares a name with her family’s new home: Měi Guó (America). Her parents acknowledge the hypocrisy of xenophobia: “It’s a strange world we live in—people will call you different with one breath and then say that we all look the same with the next angry breath.” Mei will have the responsibility of being “teacher and translator” to her parents. They might not be able to completely shield her from racism, othering, and the pressures of assimilation, but they can reassure and empower her—and they do. Mei and young readers are encouraged to rely on the “golden flame” of strength, power, and hope they carry within them. The second-person narration adds intimacy to the lyrical text. Diao’s lovely digital artwork works in tandem with Chen’s rich textual imagery to celebrate Chinese culture, family history, and language. The illustrations incorporate touchstones of Chinese mythology and art—a majestic dragon, a phoenix, and lotus flowers—as well as family photographs. One double-page spread depicts a lineup of notable Chinese Americans. In the backmatter, Chen and Diao relay their own family stories of immigration. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A shining affirmation of Chinese American identity. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-84205-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2022
A sweet and unexpected addition to the waiting-for-baby shelf.
A big, yellow hound dog has small, wonderful dreams.
Emma’s dreams are doggily simple. Rendered in gray, they manifest above her contentedly slumbering form: “singing, dancing, rolling in grass, splashing in water, going for walks,” and eating. After she wakes and eats, she naps again, sprawled on her back, tummy distended, the very picture of canine bliss. Pages turn, with Cooper’s lyrical text focusing on Emma and her sensations: “The days went on, shifting and taking shape, and now there were times when her whole body felt strange, but there was no stopping the days.” A gently curving line of overlapping Emmas, rising, stretching, scratching, shifting, and resettling, underscores time’s march. Adult readers may be anxious at this point, fearing Emma’s impending death with the page turn—but no, it turns out Emma’s been literally full of wonders, and she gazes mildly at a puppy emerging from her own body. Then there they are, seven little Emmas, and they now embody her dreams. Cooper’s brushy, loose watercolors, outlined in swoops of ink, complement his Emma-focused text. She resides in a human home, but her owner appears only as tan-skinned hands extending from the margin to offer a bowl of food, caress her snout, or towel off a pup. In this way, Cooper invites readers into Emma’s interiority, allowing them to sit quietly and wonder with her.
A sweet and unexpected addition to the waiting-for-baby shelf. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: April 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781250884763
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
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