edited by John Hollander & illustrated by Simona Mulazzani ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 22, 2005
The newest volume in the Poetry for Young People series continues the format; Hollander gathers 34 short selections on a common theme—here, real animals, as opposed to the imaginary sort—and prefaces each with cogent comments on the poet and on images or references in the poem that might be unfamiliar to young readers. His choices range from such chestnuts as Lear’s “Owl and the Pussy-cat” and Blake’s “The Tyger” to Wallace Stevens’s “Earthy Anecdote,” verses from Marianne Moore to a chameleon, May Swenson on tourists viewing bison, and, to close, a lyrical, 900-year-old fragmentary lullaby from Greek poet Alcman. Mulazzani poses animatedly the creatures in her painted illustrations, against simplified natural backgrounds, and aside from misrepresenting the titular feline in Yeats’s “Cat and the Moon” as tiger-striped, sticks to literal interpretations. Despite notably inconsistent page design that even has the text of one poem (William Carlos Williams’s “Gulls”) switching from black to white in mid-course, this, like its predecessors, will help readers at least begin to understand what poetry is all about, without waxing too intrusively pedantic. (Poetry. 10+)
Pub Date: Jan. 22, 2005
ISBN: 1-4027-0926-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Sterling
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2004
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by Rajani LaRocca ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 2, 2021
An intimate novel that beautifully confronts grief and loss.
It’s 1983, and 13-year-old Indian American Reha feels caught between two worlds.
Monday through Friday, she goes to a school where she stands out for not being White but where she has a weekday best friend, Rachel, and does English projects with potential crush Pete. On the weekends, she’s with her other best friend, Sunita (Sunny for short), at gatherings hosted by her Indian community. Reha feels frustrated that her parents refuse to acknowledge her Americanness and insist on raising her with Indian values and habits. Then, on the night of the middle school dance, her mother is admitted to the hospital, and Reha’s world is split in two again: this time, between hospital and home. Suddenly she must learn not just how to be both Indian and American, but also how to live with her mother’s leukemia diagnosis. The sections dealing with Reha’s immigrant identity rely on oft-told themes about the overprotectiveness of immigrant parents and lack the nuance found in later pages. Reha’s story of her evolving relationships with her parents, however, feels layered and real, and the scenes in which Reha must grapple with the possible loss of a parent are beautifully and sensitively rendered. The sophistication of the text makes it a valuable and thought-provoking read even for those older than the protagonist.
An intimate novel that beautifully confronts grief and loss. (Verse novel. 11-15)Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-304742-6
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2020
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by Joy Cowley ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 1999
Bishop’s spectacular photographs of the tiny red-eyed tree frog defeat an incidental text from Cowley (Singing Down the Rain, 1997, etc.). The frog, only two inches long, is enormous in this title; it appears along with other nocturnal residents of the rain forests of Central America, including the iguana, ant, katydid, caterpillar, and moth. In a final section, Cowley explains how small the frog is and aspects of its life cycle. The main text, however, is an afterthought to dramatic events in the photos, e.g., “But the red-eyed tree frog has been asleep all day. It wakes up hungry. What will it eat? Here is an iguana. Frogs do not eat iguanas.” Accompanying an astonishing photograph of the tree frog leaping away from a boa snake are three lines (“The snake flicks its tongue. It tastes frog in the air. Look out, frog!”) that neither advance nor complement the action. The layout employs pale and deep green pages and typeface, and large jewel-like photographs in which green and red dominate. The combination of such visually sophisticated pages and simplistic captions make this a top-heavy, unsatisfying title. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-590-87175-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1999
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by Hye-Eun Shin ; illustrated by Su-Bi Jeong ; edited by Joy Cowley
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