This first full-length narrative, a series opener, from board-book creator Patricelli (Hair, 2017, etc.) is a no-frills,...
Supershy fourth-grader Lily Lattuga (Italian for “lettuce”) just wants to blend in at her new school, but on the first day, she throws up on a popular girl’s shoes!
Then it gets worse: her new classmates start quacking at her after her repeated attempts to pronounce “Kwakiutl” in a list of Northwest Native American tribes—she never gets past the first syllable (an unfortunate joke)—and she gets on the wrong bus. Lucky for Lily, unselfconscious Darby Dorski extends the hand of friendship. The girls bond over their love of frogs, and the Rizzlerunk Club is born. The book’s title comes from the club’s pledge, which concludes “best buds, under frogs, with loyalty and honesty for all.” When Darby’s best friend, Jill, returns from London, loyalty and honesty are put to the test. Lily worries she’ll lose the only friend she has, and Jill is a lying troublemaker who gets Lily and Darby into one scrape after another, throwing the girls under the bus while weaseling her way out of punishment. Lily attempts to shave her unibrow after Jill makes fun of it, only to end up with a finger superglued to her forehead. Everyone appears to be white except for one classmate with a Spanish name. Lily loves to draw, and her first-person narration is livened up with her humorous line drawings reflecting her thoughts and feelings.
This first full-length narrative, a series opener, from board-book creator Patricelli (Hair, 2017, etc.) is a no-frills, funny story about friendship. (Fiction. 7-11)Pub Date: Feb. 13, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-7636-5104-6
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Oct. 15, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2017
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists.
How to raise money for a coveted poster: put your friends to work!
John, founder of the FUBU fashion line and a Shark Tank venture capitalist, offers a self-referential blueprint for financial success. Having only half of the $10 he needs for a Minka J poster, Daymond forks over $1 to buy a plain T-shirt, paints a picture of the pop star on it, sells it for $5, and uses all of his cash to buy nine more shirts. Then he recruits three friends to decorate them with his design and help sell them for an unspecified amount (from a conveniently free and empty street-fair booth) until they’re gone. The enterprising entrepreneur reimburses himself for the shirts and splits the remaining proceeds, which leaves him with enough for that poster as well as a “brand-new business book,” while his friends express other fiscal strategies: saving their share, spending it all on new art supplies, or donating part and buying a (math) book with the rest. (In a closing summation, the author also suggests investing in stocks, bonds, or cryptocurrency.) Though Miles cranks up the visual energy in her sparsely detailed illustrations by incorporating bright colors and lots of greenbacks, the actual advice feels a bit vague. Daymond is Black; most of the cast are people of color. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists. (Picture book. 7-9)Pub Date: March 21, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-56727-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
SEEN & HEARD
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