Why settle for one rousing adventure when you can have millions?
A storyteller’s toolkit, stocked with choose-your-own characters, gear, locales, hazards, and plotlines.
Following a page of instructions, readers will find labeled arrays of playfully imaginative options. First readers are invited to pick an identity from 16 choices—ranging from a “nature expert” with olive skin and dark hair to a light-skinned “jungle baby” in a leopard skin, a befuddled tourist, a writer using a wheelchair, or a monkey. From there it’s on to choose clothing; a mission (“To find gems and jewels,” or maybe a “Jungle Prince”?); equipment; companions; an itinerary; a “greedy developer,” “evil penguin,” or other foe; the enemy’s dastardly scheme; and more on the way to a pile of money, a pedicure, or some other well-earned reward. Unlike the general run of “choose your own adventure” titles, this one prompts readers to fill in the action themselves (“Describe your daring escape”), and none of the options have fatal consequences—explicitly, at least. Also notable is the racial diversity among human(ish) figures, including hovering groups of fairies and pixies. Like its series mates, this rainforest romp outdoes even the likes of Laurel Snyder’s Endlessly Ever After (2022) in getting fledgling yarn spinners up to speed. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Why settle for one rousing adventure when you can have millions? (Picture book. 6-10)Pub Date: April 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-7112-7610-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Wide Eyed Editions
Review Posted Online: April 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2022
Dizzyingly silly.
The famous superhero returns to fight another villain with all the trademark wit and humor the series is known for.
Despite the title, Captain Underpants is bizarrely absent from most of this adventure. His school-age companions, George and Harold, maintain most of the spotlight. The creative chums fool around with time travel and several wacky inventions before coming upon the evil Turbo Toilet 2000, making its return for vengeance after sitting out a few of the previous books. When the good Captain shows up to save the day, he brings with him dynamic action and wordplay that meet the series’ standards. The Captain Underpants saga maintains its charm even into this, the 11th volume. The epic is filled to the brim with sight gags, toilet humor, flip-o-ramas and anarchic glee. Holding all this nonsense together is the author’s good-natured sense of harmless fun. The humor is never gross or over-the-top, just loud and innocuous. Adults may roll their eyes here and there, but youngsters will eat this up just as quickly as they devoured every other Underpants episode.
Dizzyingly silly. (Humor. 8-10)Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-545-50490-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 3, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2014
Lively fun with animal friends.
Has Plum’s pep deserted him?
Several animals from the Athensville Zoo are on their way to visit an elementary school. Overconfident Itch the ningbing (an Australian marsupial), unaware that zookeeper Lizzie will be doing all the talking, looks forward to “lecturing eager young minds.” Plum, the usually chipper peacock, on the other hand, is anxious—maybe the schoolchildren won’t like him or he’ll get lost. So when they arrive at the school to find the students have been sent home due to a blizzard, Plum is relieved. The animals are left in a school gym for the night until three self-important class mice free them. Itch heads for the library to meet the learned turtle, but Plum reluctantly explores with his friends. When his anxiety peaks, they reassure him, and when the mice reject Meg, another peacock, as “borrrring” and uncool, they buoy her as well before everyone comes together to save Itch, who finds himself outside and stranded in a snowdrift. Unlike Leave It to Plum (2022), this is not a mystery, and the relationship focus shifts from Lizzie to the rodents, but the pace is brisk, and sequel seekers will be pleased to revisit familiar characters (if dismayed that Itch’s longing for knowledge leads to his downfall). In Phelan’s engaging grayscale pen-and-wash illustrations, Lizzie has short curly hair; text and art cue her as Latine.
Lively fun with animal friends. (how to draw Plum) (Chapter book. 7-10)Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-06-307920-5
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 24, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023
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