A droll and imaginative addition to the crepuscular corpus.
Inventive book design and shifting perspectives add cozy surprises to this bedtime snoozer, originally published in Scandinavia.
“Little chimp should be asleep by now. / Mama has sung and played 73 songs / on her ukulele.” Turning half pages that act like blankets being pulled up (or down), drowsy young nappers join a family of extraterrestrials watching from very far away as various animals and animal parents go through simple or strenuous bedtime routines—or, in the case of a deceptively quiescent tarsier, get ready to leap into an all-night frolic. All (aliens included) turn out to be surrogates for Sweetie Pie, a human child, and her stuffies reluctantly snuggling down at long last…between a pair of weary parents. In Hasan-Rokem’s translation from the Swedish, the text is poetic, sly, and funny: “Look there, in the leaves! A little sloth in a hammock! / Shhh! Both she and the hammock are asleep, as usual.” Readers will see from the illustration that the “hammock” is the little sloth’s parent. Bondestam depicts human figures with beige skin, which allows some latitude for ethnic identification. Along with adding sly anthropomorphic touches to the rest of the cast, she caps the nighttime scenes with one final one of a comically frazzled family of owls barely getting through a sunrise supper of croissants and hot chocolate before collapsing. Parents of younger children will definitely relate.
A droll and imaginative addition to the crepuscular corpus. (Novelty picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: April 13, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-63206-286-4
Page Count: 46
Publisher: Yonder
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
This is a tremendously moving story, but some people will be moved only on the second reading, after they’ve Googled “How to...
A hug shouldn’t require an instruction manual—but some do.
A porcupine can frighten even the largest animal. In this picture book, a bear and a deer, along with a small rabbit, each run away when they hear eight simple words and their name: “I need a hug. Will you cuddle me,…?” As they flee, each utters a definitive refusal that rhymes with their name. The repetitive structure gives Blabey plenty of opportunities for humor, because every animal responds to the question with an outlandish, pop-eyed expression of panic. But the understated moments are even funnier. Each animal takes a moment to think over the request, and the drawings are nuanced enough that readers can see the creatures react with slowly building anxiety or, sometimes, a glassy stare. These silent reaction shots not only show exquisite comic timing, but they make the rhymes in the text feel pleasingly subtle by delaying the final line in each stanza. The story is a sort of fable about tolerance. It turns out that a porcupine can give a perfectly adequate hug when its quills are flat and relaxed, but no one stays around long enough to find out except for an animal that has its own experiences with intolerance: a snake. It’s an apt, touching moral, but the climax may confuse some readers as they try to figure out the precise mechanics of the embrace.
This is a tremendously moving story, but some people will be moved only on the second reading, after they’ve Googled “How to pet a porcupine.” (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Jan. 29, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-338-29710-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2018
Readers are likely to love it to the moon and back.
Little Nutbrown Hare ventures out into the wide world and comes back with a new companion in this sequel to Guess How Much I Love You (1994).
Big Nutbrown Hare is too busy, so after asking permission, Little Nutbrown Hare scampers off over the rolling meadow to play by himself. After discovering that neither his shadow nor his reflection make satisfactory playmates (“You’re only another me!”), Little Nutbrown comes to Cloudy Mountain…and meets “Someone real!” It’s a white bunny who introduces herself as Tipps. But a wonderful round of digging and building and chasing about reaches an unexpected end with a game of hide-and-seek, because both hares hide! After waiting a long time to be found, Little Nutbrown Hare hops on home in disappointment, wondering whether he’ll ever see Tipps again. As it turns out, it doesn’t take long to find out, since she has followed him. “Now, where on earth did she come from?” wonders Big Nutbrown. “Her name is Tipps,” Little Nutbrown proudly replies, “and she’s my friend.” Jeram’s spacious, pale-toned, naturalistic outdoor scenes create a properly idyllic setting for this cozy development in a tender child-caregiver relationship—which hasn’t lost a bit of its appealing intimacy in the more than 25 years since its first appearance. As in the first, Big Nutbrown Hare is ungendered, facilitating pleasingly flexible readings.
Readers are likely to love it to the moon and back. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5362-1747-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
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