Wanda’s parents love her so much that they give her everything she wants, but their generosity has some bad, if predictable, side effects. Wanda seems to have it all—the biggest and best toys, the prettiest clothes, and the tastiest treats—but if she spies something that she doesn’t have, all it takes is a stomp of her foot, and she gets that too. Her tactics may have given her lots of things, but the one thing that she is lacking is a friend. One day, Wanda spies a magnificent kite in a new store in town, but the storeowner refuses to sell it to her. Wanda being Wanda, she knows that she can get that kite if she works hard enough—and proceeds to throw a tantrum. But she may have gotten more than she bargained for. As she grabs hold of the kite, it flies her up and away, dropping her on a deserted island. There she must learn to fend for herself and along the way learns that what she misses most is her parents. Rescued from the island, she begins to preach in true Thoreauvian style, “There’s more to life than things!” Wild, brightly colored illustrations are stuffed with detail, mimicking Wanda’s overstuffed life. Pattern after pattern fills the pages, creating a sense of chaos and clutter. Characters all have a bright-eyed look, save for Wanda, whose eyes look almost demonic until she calms down and learns her lesson. Simply fun from a great new artist. (Picture book. 4-7)
Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-8037-2693-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2002
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift.
A paean to teachers and their surrogates everywhere.
This gentle ode to a teacher’s skill at inspiring, encouraging, and being a role model is spoken, presumably, from a child’s viewpoint. However, the voice could equally be that of an adult, because who can’t look back upon teachers or other early mentors who gave of themselves and offered their pupils so much? Indeed, some of the self-aware, self-assured expressions herein seem perhaps more realistic as uttered from one who’s already grown. Alternatively, readers won’t fail to note that this small book, illustrated with gentle soy-ink drawings and featuring an adult-child bear duo engaged in various sedentary and lively pursuits, could just as easily be about human parent- (or grandparent-) child pairs: some of the softly colored illustrations depict scenarios that are more likely to occur within a home and/or other family-oriented setting. Makes sense: aren’t parents and other close family members children’s first teachers? This duality suggests that the book might be best shared one-on-one between a nostalgic adult and a child who’s developed some self-confidence, having learned a thing or two from a parent, grandparent, older relative, or classroom instructor.
A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-943200-08-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Compendium
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
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