A delectable dish with morsels of empathy, fair dealing, and even math in the list of ingredients.
Max the mouse makes pancakes for his four younger sibs but runs out of ingredients before he can make one for himself. What to do?
Clever use of partial pages turns a potential downer into a sweet opportunity for sharing in this Japanese import via Canada. First, of course, Max has to make batter and cook it just so—shown step by step with vertically split half pages in Nishiuchi’s bright, blocky pictures—and discover his mistake by dishing the pancakes out. Noticing his exaggerated expression of misery as he regards his empty plate, the others generously cut their pancakes into quarters and pass them over one by one…but wait, that leaves all five mice with three quarters and one piece extra. Who gets it? The fortuitous arrival of Mommy Mouse solves the problem neatly and nicely. Though the mice eat their pancakes without toppings in the illustrations, the appended recipe (which properly includes a cautionary note about adult supervision) closes with an entirely appropriate recommendation to serve with butter and maple syrup. Stack toddler-friendly tributes like Lotta Nieminen’s Pancakes! An Interactive Recipe Book (2016) and Kathryn Smith’s Pancakes With Grandma, illustrated by Seb Braun (2020), atop this yummy outing.
A delectable dish with morsels of empathy, fair dealing, and even math in the list of ingredients. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-2-89802-161-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: CrackBoom! Books
Review Posted Online: May 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A first-rate sharkfest, unusually nutritious for all its brevity.
Buzz and his buzzy buddy open a spinoff series of nonfiction early readers with an aquarium visit.
Buzz: “Like other fish, sharks breathe through gills.” Fly Guy: “GILLZZ.” Thus do the two pop-eyed cartoon tour guides squire readers past a plethora of cramped but carefully labeled color photos depicting dozens of kinds of sharks in watery settings, along with close-ups of skin, teeth and other anatomical features. In the bite-sized blocks of narrative text, challenging vocabulary words like “carnivores” and “luminescence” come with pronunciation guides and lucid in-context definitions. Despite all the flashes of dentifrice and references to prey and smelling blood in the water, there is no actual gore or chowing down on display. Sharks are “so cool!” proclaims Buzz at last, striding out of the gift shop. “I can’t wait for our next field trip!” (That will be Fly Guy Presents: Space, scheduled for September 2013.)
A first-rate sharkfest, unusually nutritious for all its brevity. (Informational easy reader. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-545-50771-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Feb. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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