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STORIES FROM BUG GARDEN

Whimsical and delightful, a celebration of imagination.

An abandoned garden is the setting for joyful play by an array of small creatures.

Prose poems, set on or next to doodly, delicate drawings, introduce this garden’s inhabitants, whose activities will appeal to young readers and listeners. Ladybug, barefoot, whistles with a blade of grass; Horsefly pretends he has flashing hooves and a streaming tail; Cricket, the great explorer, swings on a gate. Bee just wants to watch the clouds. Together with Butterfly, Dragonfly, Big and Little Ant, and Snail, they gather to watch the explosion of flowers blooming. Later, Lightning Bug leads a game of follow-the-leader. The scribbly pen-and-pencil illustrations, finished with watercolor, reveal amusing detail. After rolling all the way down the path, Roly-Poly unrolls and waves his many legs. At night, Lightning Bug watches over his friends—but Butterfly has one eye open, too. These engaging, childlike illustrations vary in size and placement on the page; double-page spreads invite particular attention. Moser introduces some unusual vocabulary but keeps most of her text simple and playful. Cricket and Big Ant seek the best way to reach a peach: at the “top of the hop” or “bottom of the drop”? The reveal comes on the next page: “KER PLOP!” Earthworm’s poem has a wormlike curve. With plentiful dialogue, these short scenes will be fun to read aloud.

Whimsical and delightful, a celebration of imagination. (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: March 22, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-7636-6534-0

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Candlewick

Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2015

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LITTLE BLUE BUNNY

A sweet, if oft-told, story.

A plush toy rabbit bonds with a boy and watches him grow into adulthood.

The boy receives the blue bunny for his birthday and immediately becomes attached to it. Unbeknownst to him, the ungendered bunny is sentient; it engages in dialogue with fellow toys, giving readers insight into its thoughts. The bunny's goal is to have grand adventures when the boy grows up and no longer needs its company. The boy spends many years playing imaginatively with the bunny, holding it close during both joyous and sorrowful times and taking it along on family trips. As a young man, he marries, starts a family, and hands over the beloved toy to his toddler-aged child in a crib. The bunny's epiphany—that he does not need to wait for great adventures since all his dreams have already come true in the boy's company—is explicitly stated in the lengthy text, which is in many ways similar to The Velveteen Rabbit (1922). The illustrations, which look hand-painted but were digitally created, are moderately sentimental with an impressionistic dreaminess (one illustration even includes a bunny-shaped cloud in the sky) and a warm glow throughout. The depiction of a teenage male openly displaying his emotions—hugging his beloved childhood toy for example—is refreshing. All human characters present as White expect for one of the boy’s friends who is Black.

A sweet, if oft-told, story. (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022

ISBN: 978-1-72825-448-7

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland

Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2022

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2022

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THE WONKY DONKEY

Hee haw.

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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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