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THE DIRTY LITTLE BOY

Name: THE DIRTY LITTLE BOY
Author: Margaret Wise Brown
ISBN: 1-890817-52-X

by Margaret Wise Brown & illustrated by Steven Salerno ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 2001

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Proclaiming "I am one dirty little boy," a lad asks his busy mother for a bath—but she instead sends him off to see how the animals clean themselves. The results may not be quite what Mama had in mind. The first picture-book version of an episode last seen in print over 40 years ago, this has been freshened up with a light editorial massage, and furnished with illustrations that, like Salerno's pictures for Bill Martin's Chicken Chuck (2000) are all exaggerated action and huge, bold, energetic brushstrokes. Getting no good results from splashing in a puddle like a bird, rolling in mud like a pig, trying out a wire brush (horse), or licking his hands to wipe his face (cat), the boy returns home for a sudsy bath, and is last seen bare, dripping, gleaming, and beaming to beat the band. The easy intimacy between tiny child and "big, round"—not to say enormous—mother comes through clearly, as does that distinctly childlike voice that generally marks Brown's prose. Not since Harry the Dirty Dog (1956) has the twin adventure of getting grimy, then scrubbing it all off, been better captured. (Picture book. 4-6)

Pub Date: April 1, 2001

ISBN: 1-890817-52-X

Page Count: 40

Publisher: N/A

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2001

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS

- BOOK REVIEW
TWO LITTLE TRAINS
by Margaret Wise Brown ; illustrated by Greg Pizzoli

- BOOK REVIEW
A HOME IN THE BARN
by Margaret Wise Brown ; illustrated by Jerry Pinkney

- BOOK REVIEW
GOOD DAY, GOOD NIGHT
by Margaret Wise Brown ; illustrated by Loren Long

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TACKY AND THE WINTER GAMES

by Helen Lester & illustrated by Lynn Munsinger ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 24, 2005

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Lester’s Tacky is tacky, though he is even more a Society of Oddfellows unto himself, a pleasing misfit among his righteous penguin cohort of Goodly, Lovely, Angel, Neatly and Perfect. Tacky is joyously oblivious of their rectitude as they prepare for the penguin Winter Games, pumping iron and skipping rope as Tacky catches a few zzz’s and equips his exer-cycle with a horn and tassels, chows pizza and donuts as the others dutifully swallow their spinach (and Munsinger is perfect here, easily capturing both sniffyness and unbridled appetite). Tacky unintentionally subverts the rules of the Games, winning but losing as officials disqualify his unorthodox stratagems. Finally, his team grabs a victory despite the fact that Tacky ate the baton. A citizen of the deep cold, it’s another Frost that Tacky emulates, the one who recommends the road not taken. Tacky, the clueless role model, takes it all the time. (Picture book. 4-6)

Pub Date: Oct. 24, 2005

ISBN: 0-618-55659-1

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Walter Lorraine/Houghton Mifflin

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2005

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S ENTERTAINMENT & SPORTS

- BOOK REVIEW
BRAVO, BUCKET HEAD!
by Helen Lester ; illustrated by Lynn Munsinger

- BOOK REVIEW
BORIS AND THE WORRISOME WAKIES
by Helen Lester ; illustrated by Lynn Munsinger

- BOOK REVIEW
TACKY AND THE HAUNTED IGLOO
by Helen Lester ; illustrated by Lynn Munsinger

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EMMA FULL OF WONDERS

by Elisha Cooper ; illustrated by Elisha Cooper ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 2, 2024

A sweet and unexpected addition to the waiting-for-baby shelf.

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A big, yellow hound dog has small, wonderful dreams.

Emma’s dreams are doggily simple. Rendered in gray, they manifest above her contentedly slumbering form: “singing, dancing, rolling in grass, splashing in water, going for walks,” and eating. After she wakes and eats, she naps again, sprawled on her back, tummy distended, the very picture of canine bliss. Pages turn, with Cooper’s lyrical text focusing on Emma and her sensations: “The days went on, shifting and taking shape, and now there were times when her whole body felt strange, but there was no stopping the days.” A gently curving line of overlapping Emmas, rising, stretching, scratching, shifting, and resettling, underscores time’s march. Adult readers may be anxious at this point, fearing Emma’s impending death with the page turn—but no, it turns out Emma’s been literally full of wonders, and she gazes mildly at a puppy emerging from her own body. Then there they are, seven little Emmas, and they now embody her dreams. Cooper’s brushy, loose watercolors, outlined in swoops of ink, complement his Emma-focused text. She resides in a human home, but her owner appears only as tan-skinned hands extending from the margin to offer a bowl of food, caress her snout, or towel off a pup. In this way, Cooper invites readers into Emma’s interiority, allowing them to sit quietly and wonder with her.

A sweet and unexpected addition to the waiting-for-baby shelf. (Picture book. 4-6)