A cautionary tale on the hazards of distracted driving? If anything, just the opposite, but it’s sure a lot of fun.
Silly results turn a multivehicle accident into a street party in this onomatopoeic import.
Spread-filling iterations of the title or a long screech appearing at every other page turn prompt young audiences to chime in on the noise. It all starts when a deer driving a yellow roadster while reading (a book, not a cellphone) hits a garbage can (“BANG”), then takes a rear-end hit from a hog driving a truck full of chickens (“BANG”) who become festooned with fashion accessories after a collision (“BANG”) with the giraffe on the way home from the store, and so on. Subsequent tailgating motorists shower the growing chaos with tires, fish, veggies, little bunnies, paint and, in a climactic four-page foldout panorama, ice cream. Just to give the escalating catastrophe/frolic a more surreal air, Timmers wildly exaggerates his animal cast’s features and expressions and adds high-sheen highlights to the surfaces of his brightly colored, sharply defined scenes. Carping critics and motor-safety wonks may be displeased to see all of the victims laughing at the way their flying cargoes end up adorning all and sundry. The violence here is strictly cartoon-style though, with no harm done and ice cream for all at the end.
A cautionary tale on the hazards of distracted driving? If anything, just the opposite, but it’s sure a lot of fun. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-8775-7918-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Gecko Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 13, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2013
A charming tale of an athlete who may not steal any bases but who will certainly steal readers’ hearts.
Ohtani, pitcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers, teams up with Blank and Liem to tell the story of how his dog, Decoy, threw out a ceremonial first pitch.
It’s a big day! Decoy leaps “off the bed. Then back onto the bed. Then off the bed.” The enthusiastic pup heads outside to practice with his lucky baseball but is quickly distracted by squirrels (“we’ll play later!”), airplanes (“flyin’ high!”), and flowers (“smell ya soon!”). Dog and pitcher then head to the ballpark. In the locker room, Decoy high-paws Shohei’s teammates. It’s nearly time! But as Shohei prepares to warm up, Decoy realizes that he’s forgotten something important: his lucky ball. Without it, there will be “no championships, no parades, and no hot dogs!” Back home he goes, returning just in time. With Shohei at the plate, Decoy runs from the mound to his owner, rolling the ball into Shohei’s mitt for a “Striiiiike!” Related from a dog’s point of view, Ohtani and Blank’s energetic text lends the tale a sense of urgency and suspense. Liem’s illustrations capture the excitement of the first day of baseball season and the joys of locker room camaraderie, as well as Shohei and Decoy’s mutual affection—even when the ball is drenched in slobber, Shohei’s love for his pet shines through, and clearly, Decoy is focused when it matters.
A charming tale of an athlete who may not steal any bases but who will certainly steal readers’ hearts. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2026
ISBN: 9780063460775
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2025
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
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