Kaplanoglou pokes light fun at the yin/yang of the mother/daughter experience.
Mothers and daughters have different concerns as they wend their ways through the world. Kaplanoglou counterpoises, in a simple scheme of two sentences per double-page spread, the elder and youthful approaches: “Mama Bear dreams while she sleeps. Little Bear dreams while awake.” Mama Bear is protective: “Mama Bear runs and hides for safety. Little Bear thinks hiding is a game.” And both have their bugbears, as it were: “Mama Bear is afraid of too much light. Little Bear is afraid of darkness.” Carefully blending and bleeding his watercolors, Ferri brings a soft smokiness to the proceedings (in which Mama Bear wears a string of pearls), heightening the tenderness of the bears’ relationship, despite some disagreements: “Mama Bear wonders why Little Bears acts naughty.” It looks as though Little Bear has pasted lily pads on Mama Bear. “Little Bear wonders why Mama Bear always says ‘don’t.’ ” Such is life, but while Mama Bear is there to instruct and shelter—“Mama Bear sleeps with her back to the snow. Little Bear sleeps with her back against Mama Bear”—she also knows when to loosen the apron strings: “Mama Bear treads familiar paths. Little Bear likes to find new paths.” Affection runs through the story like a lazy stream.
There’s much to identify with in this gentle, perceptive book, no matter the gender or species. (Picture book. 3-8)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-988-8341-22-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: minedition
Review Posted Online: Sept. 4, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2016
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.
Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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Pete, the cat who couldn’t care less, celebrates Christmas with his inimitable lassitude.
If it weren’t part of the title and repeated on every other page, readers unfamiliar with Pete’s shtick might have a hard time arriving at “groovy” to describe his Christmas celebration, as the expressionless cat displays not a hint of groove in Dean’s now-trademark illustrations. Nor does Pete have a great sense of scansion: “On the first day of Christmas, / Pete gave to me… / A road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” The cat is shown at the wheel of a yellow microbus strung with garland and lights and with a star-topped tree tied to its roof. On the second day of Christmas Pete gives “me” (here depicted as a gray squirrel who gets on the bus) “2 fuzzy gloves, and a road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” On the third day, he gives “me” (now a white cat who joins Pete and the squirrel) “3 yummy cupcakes,” etc. The “me” mentioned in the lyrics changes from day to day and gift to gift, with “4 far-out surfboards” (a frog), “5 onion rings” (crocodile), and “6 skateboards rolling” (a yellow bird that shares its skateboards with the white cat, the squirrel, the frog, and the crocodile while Pete drives on). Gifts and animals pile on until the microbus finally arrives at the seaside and readers are told yet again that it’s all “GROOVY!”
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among . (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-267527-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S HOLIDAYS & CELEBRATIONS
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