Gentle, joyful encouragement for young readers and pre-readers to discover the rewards of a good book.
Hutton’s charming little board book, the newest in a series, encourages young children to explore the pleasures of real books with real pages.
On his website, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital pediatrician Hutton, backed by multiple studies and research, talks about the importance of real books and nonelectronic play in the development of very young brains. “Children are not small adults. Their brains are different. Their bodies are different. Their spirit is different. Their needs are different,” he says. Hutton would like to see all children “stay screen-free until 3,” and he recommends judicious use of electronics thereafter. He may have crafted his children’s’ board-book series with that science- and research-fueled viewpoint in mind, but don’t expect a heavy-handed approach. His new entry in the endearing series is illustrated with joyful color and adorable renderings of a snug, childcentric world. Its celebratory simplicity conveys Hutton’s “books are wonderful” message with a feather-light touch. Each page features clear and brief text made interesting with color changes and small variations in style. (“Adventure books: pirate ship! Zooming cars!” / “Lullabies—yawning moon, twinkling stars.”) One page is even a “find all the books” game. In Kang’s peaceful illustrations, children cozy up with a dad for read-aloud time and go to sleep with a mom’s bedtime story. They read under a tree, on the floor, on a picnic blanket and on a bench with a squeaky mouse. They learn that books can be about “anything dreams can plot.” If that means “[h]appy hippos driving trucks—okay, why not?”
Gentle, joyful encouragement for young readers and pre-readers to discover the rewards of a good book.Pub Date: June 18, 2012
ISBN: 9781936669066
Page Count: 14
Publisher: blue manatee press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own...
The sturdy Little Blue Truck is back for his third adventure, this time delivering Christmas trees to his band of animal pals.
The truck is decked out for the season with a Christmas wreath that suggests a nose between headlights acting as eyeballs. Little Blue loads up with trees at Toad’s Trees, where five trees are marked with numbered tags. These five trees are counted and arithmetically manipulated in various ways throughout the rhyming story as they are dropped off one by one to Little Blue’s friends. The final tree is reserved for the truck’s own use at his garage home, where he is welcomed back by the tree salestoad in a neatly circular fashion. The last tree is already decorated, and Little Blue gets a surprise along with readers, as tiny lights embedded in the illustrations sparkle for a few seconds when the last page is turned. Though it’s a gimmick, it’s a pleasant surprise, and it fits with the retro atmosphere of the snowy country scenes. The short, rhyming text is accented with colored highlights, red for the animal sounds and bright green for the numerical words in the Christmas-tree countdown.
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own tree that will put a twinkle in a toddler’s eyes. (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-544-32041-3
Page Count: 24
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2014
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Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come.
Little Blue Truck and his pal Toad meet friends old and new on a springtime drive through the country.
This lift-the-flap, interactive entry in the popular Little Blue Truck series lacks the narrative strength and valuable life lessons of the original Little Blue Truck (2008) and its sequel, Little Blue Truck Leads the Way (2009). Both of those books, published for preschoolers rather than toddlers, featured rich storylines, dramatic, kinetic illustrations, and simple but valuable life lessons—the folly of taking oneself too seriously, the importance of friends, and the virtue of taking turns, for example. At about half the length and with half as much text as the aforementioned titles, this volume is a much quicker read. Less a story than a vernal celebration, the book depicts a bucolic drive through farmland and encounters with various animals and their young along the way. Beautifully rendered two-page tableaux teem with butterflies, blossoms, and vibrant pastel, springtime colors. Little Blue greets a sheep standing in the door of a barn: “Yoo-hoo, Sheep! / Beep-beep! / What’s new?” Folding back the durable, card-stock flap reveals the barn’s interior and an adorable set of twin lambs. Encounters with a duck and nine ducklings, a cow with a calf, a pig with 10 (!) piglets, a family of bunnies, and a chicken with a freshly hatched chick provide ample opportunity for counting and vocabulary work.
Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come. (Board book. 1-4)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-544-93809-0
Page Count: 16
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
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