A purpose piece without a clear purpose.
Make-A-Wish creates a perfect day for a kid with a serious illness.
Mark, white and blond, stays in the hospital for long stretches because “he has bad cells in his blood.” One day the wish fairies arrive, and Mark wishes “to catch bad guys.” On his special day with firefighters (teaching him to be brave) and police officers, Mark climbs a high ladder, shoots a fire hose, and handcuffs his father. Then a call comes in: there’s a break-in at a hamburger stand. Whether that break-in is real or arranged by the wish fairies (why are Mark and the police wearing balaclavas?), the ending’s safe and comical, though it hinges on a mocking caricature of fat people. Mark’s day is full of grins; not all readers would feel such safety and glee around police, but Mark sure does. Timmermans’ stiff, somewhat cartoony illustrations are emotionally cold, somehow conveying the characters’ fun without offering it to readers. In an unfortunate visual trope of Asian characters, fireman Liang’s eyes appear closed. The stodgy prose offers lessons to readers (classmates can’t visit Mark, but “a nice drawing is always a good idea!”) but never really explains why the wish fairies are a big deal. While serious childhood illness is rare fodder for picture books, the level of seriousness here is underplayed until the author’s note—a section readers often skip—that explains that Make-A-Wish serves kids with “life-threatening medical conditions.”
A purpose piece without a clear purpose. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: June 13, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-60537-335-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clavis
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2017
Only for dedicated fans of the series.
When a kid gets the part of the ninja master in the school play, it finally seems to be the right time to tackle the closet monster.
“I spot my monster right away. / He’s practicing his ROAR. / He almost scares me half to death, / but I won’t be scared anymore!” The monster is a large, fluffy poison-green beast with blue hands and feet and face and a fluffy blue-and-green–striped tail. The kid employs a “bag of tricks” to try to catch the monster: in it are a giant wind-up shark, two cans of silly string, and an elaborate cage-and-robot trap. This last works, but with an unexpected result: the monster looks sad. Turns out he was only scaring the boy to wake him up so they could be friends. The monster greets the boy in the usual monster way: he “rips a massive FART!!” that smells like strawberries and lime, and then they go to the monster’s house to meet his parents and play. The final two spreads show the duo getting ready for bed, which is a rather anticlimactic end to what has otherwise been a rambunctious tale. Elkerton’s bright illustrations have a TV-cartoon aesthetic, and his playful beast is never scary. The narrator is depicted with black eyes and hair and pale skin. Wallace’s limping verses are uninspired at best, and the scansion and meter are frequently off.
Only for dedicated fans of the series. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4926-4894-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The dynamic interaction between the characters invites readers to take risks, push boundaries, and have a little unscripted...
Reinvention is the name of the game for two blobs of clay.
A blue-eyed gray blob and a brown-eyed brown blob sit side by side, unsure as to what’s going to happen next. The gray anticipates an adventure, while the brown appears apprehensive. A pair of hands descends, and soon, amid a flurry of squishing and prodding and poking and sculpting, a handsome gray wolf and a stately brown owl emerge. The hands disappear, leaving the friends to their own devices. The owl is pleased, but the wolf convinces it that the best is yet to come. An ear pulled here and an extra eye placed there, and before you can shake a carving stick, a spurt of frenetic self-exploration—expressed as a tangled black scribble—reveals a succession of smug hybrid beasts. After all, the opportunity to become a “pig-e-phant” doesn’t come around every day. But the sound of approaching footsteps panics the pair of Picassos. How are they going to “fix [them]selves” on time? Soon a hippopotamus and peacock are staring bug-eyed at a returning pair of astonished hands. The creative naiveté of the “clay mates” is perfectly captured by Petty’s feisty, spot-on dialogue: “This was your idea…and it was a BAD one.” Eldridge’s endearing sculpted images are photographed against the stark white background of an artist’s work table to great effect.
The dynamic interaction between the characters invites readers to take risks, push boundaries, and have a little unscripted fun of their own . (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: June 20, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-316-30311-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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