A home-away-home tale worth the trip.
This latest installment in the whimsical Princess Truly series explores the magic potential of Afro hair.
Princess Truly, a young brown girl styling a purple tutu, green tennis shoes, a white shirt with black stripes, and two shimmering puffballs in her hair, begins her first-person narration extolling the wonders of her “fluffy, puffy curls” that shine and shimmer when she believes in herself. In this adventure tale, her hair opens up portals into other worlds—worlds where she can ride a dinosaur, play hide-and-seek near a volcano, visit the pyramids with camels (where she can interpret hieroglyphics), and reach the depths of the sea in a purple, fish-shaped submarine. This fantasy story of a little brown girl with magical hair flips the script on negative cultural messages about nappy hair, giving kids with tight coils reasons not only to be proud of their hair, but to see it as a magical asset with the power to make fun happen. Young readers will enjoy following the princess’s closest animal companions, who later appear in her cozy bedroom. Rauscher’s sprightly watercolor illustrations strike an appropriate balance between pages awash with color and those with expanses of white space. Although the rhyming poetry is somewhat uneven, fans of this series will appreciate taking this latest journey with Princess Truly.
A home-away-home tale worth the trip. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-338-16719-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Nov. 12, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A funny David-versus-Goliath story with a one-word question serving as the slingshot. (Picture book. 3-5)
Doctor X-Ray, a megalomaniac with an X-ray blaster and an indestructible battle suit, crashes through the ceiling of the local mall.
Innocent patrons scatter to safety. But one curious child gazes directly at the bully and asks: “Why?” At first, Doctor X-Ray answers with all the menace and swagger of a supervillain. The curious child, armed with only a stuffed bear and clad in a bright red dress, is not satisfied with the answers and continues asking: “Why?” As his pale cheeks flush with emotion, Doctor X-Ray peels back the onion of his interior life, unearthing powerful reasons behind his pursuit of tyranny. This all sounds heavy, but the humorously monotonous questions coupled with free-wheeling illustrations by Keane set a quick pace with comical results. At 60 pages, the book has room to follow this thread back to the diabolical bully’s childhood. Most of the answers go beyond a child’s understanding—parental entertainment between the howl of the monosyllabic chorus. It is the digital artwork, which is reminiscent of Quentin Blake’s, that creates a joyful undercurrent of rebellion with bold and loose brush strokes, patches of color, and expressive faces. The illustrations harken to a previous era save for the thoroughly liberated Asian child speaking truth to power.
A funny David-versus-Goliath story with a one-word question serving as the slingshot. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4521-6863-0
Page Count: 60
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Sweet.
A caregiving bear shares with its cub how love has defined their relationship from the first moment and through the years as the cub has grown.
With rhymes and a steady rhythm that are less singsong-y than similar books, Stansbie seems to have hit a sweet spot for this offering on the I-love-you-always shelf. Readers follow the adult and child as they share special moments together—a sunset, a splash in a pond, climbing a tree, a snuggle—and the adult tells the child that the love it feels has only grown. Stansbie also takes care not to put promises in the adult bear’s mouth that can’t be delivered, acknowledging that physical proximity is not always possible: “Wherever you are, / even when we’re apart… // I’ll love you forever / with all of my heart.” The large trim size helps the sweet illustrations shine; their emphasis is on the close relationship between parent and child. Shaped peekaboo windows offer glimpses of preceding and succeeding pages, images and text carefully placed to work whatever the context. While the die cuts on the interior pages will not hold up to rough handling, they do add whimsy and delight to the book as a whole: “And now that you’re bigger, / you make my heart sing. / My / beautiful / wonderful / magical / thing.” Those last three adjectives are positioned in leaf-shaped cutouts, the turn of the page revealing the roly-poly cub in a pile of leaves, three formed by the die-cuts. Opposite, three vignettes show the cub appreciating the “beautiful,” the “wonderful,” and the “magical.”
Sweet. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-68412-910-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Silver Dolphin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
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