A winning choice for just about anywhere that’s on a map.
This nighttime adventure teaches children about different types of maps.
In the days of GPS software and smartphones that tell us where to go, essential learned skills such as reading maps may not be passed along to younger children. Hesselberth takes on this challenge of instruction through the story of Sam, an orange cat who exudes attitude. Each night after her human companions are safely in bed, Sam slips out of their house and begins an adventurous stroll around her community. Every few pages, Sam’s journey is explained using a map and map-based terminology. Important terms, such as “compass rose” and “blueprints,” are explained in pop-up boxes that accompany Sam’s story, but the focus broadens beyond simple geographical maps. As Sam explores, other types of pictorial guides are also explained. Anatomical maps, cross-section diagrams, constellation charts, and many others are described and pictured. The flow of the story is smooth, and the introduction of each new piece of cartography feels organic. Hesselberth’s artwork, a combination of acrylic, gouache, and digital manipulation, is clear and will show well in large groups. The added backmatter further defines the cartographic styles used throughout the story. Educators will find this a useful tool for introducing new concepts of space and location.
A winning choice for just about anywhere that’s on a map. (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-274122-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018
Silly reads for new readers to dig into.
A turnip-loving duck and its friends defend their garden.
Alas, the duck, sheep, dog, and donkey immediately discover the eponymous pest in the garden when it (a groundhog?) eats a row of beans. The duck is frantic that turnips are next, but instead the pest eats the sheep’s favorite crop: corn. Peas occupy the next row, and the pest gobbles them up, too. Instead of despairing, however, the donkey cries, “Yippee! He ate ALL THE PEAS!” and catching the others’ puzzled looks, continues, “I don’t like peas.” After this humorous twist, the only uneaten row is sown with turnips, and the duck leaps to devour them before the pest can do so. In a satisfying, funny conclusion, the duck beams when the dog, sheep, and donkey resolve to plant a new garden and protect it with a fence, only to find out that it will exclude not just the groundhog, but the duck, too. A companion release, What Is Chasing Duck?, has the same brand of humor and boldly outlined figures rendered in a bright palette, but its storyline doesn’t come together as well since it’s unclear why the duck is scared and why the squirrel that was chasing it doesn’t recognize the others when they turn and chase him at book’s end.
Silly reads for new readers to dig into. (Early reader. 6-8)Pub Date: June 6, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-544-94165-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2017
“It’s time to head back home,” the narrator concludes. “You’ve touched the Earth in so many ways.” Who knew it would be so...
A pro bono Twinkie of a book invites readers to fly off in a magic plane to bring clean water to our planet’s oceans, deserts, and brown children.
Following a confusingly phrased suggestion beneath a soft-focus world map to “touch the Earth. Now touch where you live,” a shake of the volume transforms it into a plane with eyes and feathered wings that flies with the press of a flat, gray “button” painted onto the page. Pressing like buttons along the journey releases a gush of fresh water from the ground—and later, illogically, provides a filtration device that changes water “from yucky to clean”—for thirsty groups of smiling, brown-skinned people. At other stops, a tap on the button will “help irrigate the desert,” and touching floating bottles and other debris in the ocean supposedly makes it all disappear so the fish can return. The 20 children Coh places on a globe toward the end are varied of skin tone, but three of the four young saviors she plants in the flier’s cockpit as audience stand-ins are white. The closing poem isn’t so openly parochial, though it seldom rises above vague feel-good sentiments: “Love the Earth, the moon and sun. / All the children can be one.”
“It’s time to head back home,” the narrator concludes. “You’ve touched the Earth in so many ways.” Who knew it would be so easy to clean the place up and give everyone a drink? (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: April 11, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5107-2083-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sky Pony Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 3, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
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