Kelly, an eight-year-old aspiring writer, is the oldest of three children and has just moved to a new house where she shares a room with her messy sister Erin. The only kids on her block are two boys who are friendly but don't share her interests. She thinks everyone in her family is wonderful at something except for her, until she finds a private place to write her book (about a girl who becomes wonderful), Victoria. There's very little to hold interest in this story; Kelly's problems are minor, of importance only to her, and she is so self- pitying she becomes unlikable. Enderle and Tessler (A Pile of Pigs, 1993, etc.) don't give Kelly enough personality to make her real; throughout the book, the action reads more like filler than plotting. Sims's trademark black-and-white drawings amiably assist in establishing the setting. (Fiction. 6-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1996
ISBN: 1-56402-534-9
Page Count: 106
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1996
This easy reader for children reading at the fluency level recounts the story of a girl named Mary Ann Anning and her dog, Tray. They lived on the coast of England in the early 1800s, although the time frame is given only as “a long, long time ago.” Mary Ann and Tray became famous for their discoveries of fossils, including dinosaur bones. They discovered the first pterodactyl found in England, and the name was assigned to their fossil. The story focuses a little too much on the dog, and the title misses a great opportunity to completely acknowledge a girl accomplishing something important in the scientific world, especially in a much earlier era and without formal training or education. Despite this drawback, both Mary Ann and Tray are appealing characters and the discovery of the fossils and subsequent notice from scientists, collectors, and even royalty is appealing and well written. Sullivan’s illustrations provide intriguing period details in costumes, tools, and buildings, as well as a clever front endpaper of fossil-strewn ground covered with muddy paw prints. (Easy reader. 6-8)
Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-689-85708-X
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2004
Energetic enough to carry younger rocketeers off the launch pad if not into a very high orbit.
The bubble-helmeted feline explains what rockets do and the role they have played in sending people (and animals) into space.
Addressing a somewhat younger audience than in previous outings (Professor Astro Cat’s Frontiers of Space, 2013, etc.), Astro Cat dispenses with all but a light shower of “factoroids” to describe how rockets work. A highly selective “History of Space Travel” follows—beginning with a crew of fruit flies sent aloft in 1947, later the dog Laika (her dismal fate left unmentioned), and the human Yuri Gagarin. Then it’s on to Apollo 11 in 1969; the space shuttles Discovery, Columbia, and Challenger (the fates of the latter two likewise elided); the promise of NASA’s next-gen Orion and the Space Launch System; and finally vague closing references to other rockets in the works for local tourism and, eventually, interstellar travel. In the illustrations the spacesuited professor, joined by a mouse and cat in similar dress, do little except float in space and point at things. Still, the art has a stylish retro look, and portraits of Sally Ride and Guion Bluford diversify an otherwise all-white, all-male astronaut corps posing heroically or riding blocky, geometric spacecraft across starry reaches.
Energetic enough to carry younger rocketeers off the launch pad if not into a very high orbit. (glossary) (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-911171-55-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Flying Eye Books
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018
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