Mordant readers will be thrilled to find a kindred soul.
Zombies, it turns out, are a lot like Oscar the Grouch.
The undead Israeli narrator of this picture book hates Luna Park in Tel Aviv because the roller coaster has “too many happy people” and the Israel Museum because it has “too many beautiful things.” Zombies, it seems, prefer to vacation in crumbling hotels full of roaches and bedbugs. Grouchy readers, or anyone who’s sick of conventional travel guides, will love the vacation suggestions. The main character goes to see endangered species—they’re also “almost dead”—and spends several pages visiting the Dead Sea. In fact, the book turns into an odd sort of advertisement for that site, with a two-page afterword answering questions like, “How do you float in the Dead Sea?” The promotion may not work on mainstream tourists, but the book will appeal to anyone with Charles Addams’ sense of humor. It’s relentlessly grim with one exception: Ruiz’s pictures of cuddly animals are absolutely adorable. Even the narrator ends up hugging a few kittens in a touching break of character. But the pictures of the zombie are wonderfully grotesque, with bulging eyeballs and jagged teeth. The gray skin and youthful appearance (at age 800) also make the narrator’s race and gender ambiguous, though the other characters come from a wide variety of faiths and ethnicities. But anyone who’s the least bit morbid will find the book hilarious.
Mordant readers will be thrilled to find a kindred soul. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-68115-557-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Apples & Honey Press
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Kid-friendly dark humor.
The chicken crosses the road…and arrives on the other side as a ghost.
The action kicks off before the title page when the chicken crossing the road winds up a splatter of feathers against the grille of a tractor trailer. When its ghost rises from the squished remains, it meets a host of other animal ghosts that encourage the new poultrygeist to start getting scary. They probably didn’t realize, however, that they’d be the ones to be frightened. Geron’s text is full of punny lines like “It’s time to get foul, fowl!” and “Ghosts of a feather haunt together!” Midway through, the poultrygeist turns to readers to make sure they’re not too scared. This is a nice touch, maintaining engagement while also giving more timid readers time to take a beat. Oswald’s illustrations display masterful use of color, with bright, ghostly animals against a dark, often all-black background, the dialogue shown in colors that correspond to the speakers. These ghosts do become scary but not enough to completely terrorize readers. Oswald’s skill is seen in full effect, as readers witness only the animal ghosts’ reactions to the poultrygeist’s scariest face, building suspense for the full reveal. This book is just right for kids easing into the slightly scary and macabre but who still want a safe and fun read.
Kid-friendly dark humor. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Aug. 17, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5362-1050-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Series fans won’t be disappointed, but young readers and listeners who know only the original ditty may find this a touch...
Having eaten pretty much everything on land in 13 previous versions of the classic song, Colandro’s capaciously stomached oldster goes to sea.
Once again the original cumulative rhyme’s naturalistic aspects are dispensed with, so that not only doesn’t the old lady die, but neither do any of the creatures she consumes. Instead, the titular shark “left no mark,” a squid follows down the hatch to “float with the shark,” a fish to “dance with the squid,” an eel to “brighten the fish” (with “fluorescent light!” as a subsequent line explains), and so on—until at the end it’s revealed to be all pretending anyway on a visit to an aquarium. Likewise, though Lee outfits the bespectacled binge-eater with a finny tail and the requisite bra for most of the extended episode, she regains human feet and garb at the end. In the illustrations, the old lady and one of the two children who accompany her are pink-skinned; the other has frizzy hair and an amber complexion. A set of nature notes on the featured victims and a nautical seek-and-find that will send viewers back to the earlier pictures modestly enhance this latest iteration.
Series fans won’t be disappointed, but young readers and listeners who know only the original ditty may find this a touch bland. (Early reader. 6-8)Pub Date: March 27, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-338-12993-9
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Nov. 21, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
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