Third grader Marvin Redpost returns (Why Pick on Me?, 1993, etc.) in the fifth book in this Stepping Stone series. On the day when his teacher and class have decided to wear clothes with holes, the President of the United States makes a surprise visit to their classroom, along with reporters and TV crews. After he makes a statement about citizenship, he takes questions, and Marvin’s question about how to become president causes him to be singled out on the TV news that evening. This lightweight, enjoyable story is endowed with a realistic sense of what children are like, how they talk and act; less realistic are aspects of school, including one teacher’s belly-button revealing outfit. A final scene in which Marvin’s parents won’t listen to him is never satisfyingly resolved, but it’s balanced by a very gratifying earlier scene when a teacher stands up for a student encountering a pushy reporter. The story hums along with its own cheerful energy, much like Marvin himself. (Fiction. 6-9)
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-679-98999-4
Page Count: 67
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Old friends and new will hope this highly successful sequel will not be the last starring this inventive, original child.
Who will be 6-year-old Dory’s friend at school if she doesn’t take Mary the monster with her?
Dory’s older siblings have plenty of advice for the new school year: “Do NOT use your imagination!” her sister warns her. “DON’T BE YOURSELF.” Remembering the problems Mary caused the year before, Dory determines to start school without the imaginary friend who behaved so badly. Indeed, right away she meets a girl with a poufy dress and two missing front teeth, surely a potential friend. But how can Dory play with Rosabelle when the hopscotch girls drag her away at recess? Luckily, monster Mary gives better advice than her older sister does. Dory reverts to her imaginative self, and by the end of the week, she’s gained a real true friend whose imagination matches her own. Dory’s first-person account is punctuated by childlike black-and-white drawings, mirroring the action described and sometimes extending the story. Those who were introduced to Dory’s appealing fantasy world in Dory Fantasmagory (2014) will be pleased at the return of her fairy godmother, Mr. Nuggy, only temporarily transformed into a chicken by the witch Mrs. Gobble Gracker. The humor and familiar school setting will invite new fans.
Old friends and new will hope this highly successful sequel will not be the last starring this inventive, original child. (Fiction. 6-9)Pub Date: July 7, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-525-42866-4
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: March 31, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The whole is attractive visually but seems far more like the kind of gift book adults like to give to one another than a...
A “Cinderella” retelling illustrated in a combination of cutaway silhouettes and painted pages.
The story, told simply in bare outline with no inflection nor energy, is not the point in this version of the Cinderella tale. It is based on both Perrault’s and the Grimms’ tellings, according to an introductory note. The point of this small volume, published in Great Britain in 2013, is the wondrous fine if slightly mechanical illustrations. The endpapers are framed in a marvelous curlicued frieze of pumpkins and vines that surrounds a spike-heeled glass slipper. Within the book, every other page is a cut-paper image in a solid matte color, made to work whether it overlays the left- or right-hand page. The non–cut-paper pages are done in pale hues and feature pleasingly repetitive patterns of trees, floral motifs, and so on. For instance, as Cinderella and the Prince dance, first the cut-paper page places them against the ballroom backdrop on recto, and then, when readers turn it, they appear between a beaming king and queen and crabby stepsisters on the verso. The stepsisters are described as ugly and are certainly mean, but in the end, Cinderella forgives them, has them as bridesmaids, and everyone lives happily ever after.
The whole is attractive visually but seems far more like the kind of gift book adults like to give to one another than a version that children might enjoy. (Picture book/fairy tale. 6-9)Pub Date: June 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-85707-843-5
Page Count: 52
Publisher: Tango Books
Review Posted Online: March 31, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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