When Timothy (a typical Lionni mouse) looks in the mirror, he's startled to see a stranger in black who looks a lot like a businessman with a tail. So he leaves his city home and sets out for the country, where the mice are afraid of him until friendly Spinny names him Mr. McMouse. It's explained that he'll have to take some tests if he wants a "field mouse license": berry- eating, running, and tree-climbing. He fails the first two, heroically saves Spinny when a cat interrupts the third, and is awarded an Honorary License. Lionni's collages are clean and handsomely composed, and his expressive figures are appealing, but the story here—beginning as a rather adult parable, then degenerating into formula—lacks direction. Still, it's told with style and good humor, while the art of this three-time Caldecott Honor winner is always of interest. (Picture book. 3-7)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1992
ISBN: 0-679-83890-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 1992
Fish sporting bright colors and broadly brushed patterns flash across solid blue color fields, as Little Fish introduces finny friends, from “spotty fish, stripy fish, happy fish, gripy fish,” to “eye fish, shy fish, fly fish, sky fish.” Cousins slips in several opportunities for counting, along with all the color and pattern recognition practice, and has Little Fish close on an intimate note, with “the one I love the best,” his mom, coming in for a smooch. Preschoolers will happily dive into this oversized cousin to Lois Ehlert’s Fish Eyes (1990), and Cousins’ own Maisy’s Rainbow Dream (2003). (Picture book. 3-5)
Pub Date: June 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-7636-2741-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2005
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Slight, though silly and amusing.
Barnacle longs for a change in routine.
A lone, pale barnacle hangs over the blue water, affixed by its hatlike shell to the bottom of a wooden pier. Here it seems to the barnacle that every day is just about the same: “The tide comes IN. // I am WET and COLD. / The tide goes OUT. // I am DRY and HOT.” The crustacean watches the world go by, or at least as much of it as is visible from one fixed vantage point. Four appendages wave expressively below an exaggeratedly cartoonish face. Its expression is scowling and grumpy: “I am BORED.” When a yellow, polka-dot fish swims by, Barnacle is struck by a thought: “I bet his days are so FUN.” Perceptive readers may notice that from this point Barnacle is actually not entirely bored, as the many delights available to this brightly colored fish play out—at least in Barnacle’s imagination. Barnacle pictures the sunny, big-eyed fish happily engaged in entertaining, alliterative activities in the pale blue sea: “I bet he DIVES with dolphins. / I bet he SOARS with sailfish.” But a reversal in fortune demonstrates that excitement and boredom are all in how a situation is perceived (and also that, as in most of nature, eating or being eaten is the rule). Fenske’s open, flat-colored, loose-lined, animated cartoon style and simple dialogue-bubble text in a large, bold font are inviting for new readers.
Slight, though silly and amusing. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: May 10, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-86504-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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