An engaging environmental message from an endearing canine character.
In this children’s book, a dog explains the reasons why piping plovers are endangered and the measures being taken to protect them.
Nine-year-old Bella narrates that she’s a black Newfoundland whose retirement mission is “to help wildlife” with her son Blue, and “my human,” Katie. (Bella’s a former journalist who wrote for such magazines as “BONE APPETIT” and “DOG’S DIGEST.”) Newfoundlands make good “Ambassador” animals, she says, because they’re gentle as well as protective. And many species need protecting, she notes, due to factors such as habitat loss, pollution, the climate crisis, and “human-wildlife conflict,” as when piping plovers and humans want to share the same beach: “shorebirds are one of the most threatened bird families in the world,” notes Katie. In Little Compton, Rhode Island, Goosewing Beach is the site of a salt-marsh nature conservancy that protects plovers’ nests during breeding season. One plover, Hercules, has a damaged wing feather and gets left behind when the other birds head south for the winter, so Bella and Blue stand guard, allowing Hercules to rest, undisturbed by predators. After speaking with a red fox drawn to the beach by humans’ garbage, Bella thinks of an appropriate slogan: “People, Predators, Pets, and Piping Plovers: we’re all connected.” She convinces local cats “to cut back on evening forays” at the beach and finishes by listing ways humans can help protect plovers, such as by picking up beach garbage and keeping felines indoors. In her debut, Dolan presents her ecological message with an effective mix of facts and anthropomorphic storytelling. She clearly explains what’s at stake and how humans can contribute to rescuing endangered birds. Bella has an appealing personality; her protectiveness is touching, and as an “Ambassador,” she’s even polite to cats. The author also straightforwardly explains the scientific material, such as how an ecosystem is thrown out of balance when “apex predators” disappear and “mesopredators” thrive. She’s convincing without hammering the points home, making it more likely that kids will be inspired to make their own environmental contributions. Oksner’s (Barking, 2017, etc.) softly shaded watercolor illustrations are lovely and capture the animals’ distinctive charms.
An engaging environmental message from an endearing canine character.Pub Date: Jan. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-79320-097-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Time Tunnel Media
Review Posted Online: May 29, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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