Energy and imagination reign from the Irish author-illustrator of Lizzie and Skunk. A boy asks the cat on the brick wall next to his house if he’s a tiger, and for a while, they are tigers together. The landscape and the protagonists transmogrify as the backyard becomes a lush jungle and the boy and the cat become striped. But then, “Oh, don’t go! / I don’t want to be a tiger all alone.” Next, the boy asks his dog if he’s a wolf, and boy and dog howl at the moon. The dog slinks away, too, and next a laundry basket and a fishpond turn the boy and a fish into sailors on the sea. But the fish goes and the boy is left alone by the brick wall once again. Meanwhile, on the other side of that wall, a family is moving in to an old house. There’s a boy: “I’m a boy like you,” he says, but our hero points out that he’s a “Tiger-Wolf-Sailor on the Sea” and asks if he’ll be a tiger, too. The new boy responds that “we’ll be tigers two.” The soft, clean watercolors limn each transformation gently: the boy is always wearing his T-shirt even when he’s slightly furry and has wolf ears, or is striped and clawed. The landscape shimmers from backyard to moonlit forest to ocean and back again in a perfect sense of pretend. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-7613-1498-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2002
Too cute to be spooky indeed but most certainly sweet.
A ghost longs to be scary, but none of the creepy personas she tries on fit.
Misty, a feline ghost with big green eyes and long whiskers, wants to be the frightening presence that her haunted house calls for, but sadly, she’s “too cute to be spooky.” She dons toilet paper to resemble a mummy, attempts to fly on a broom like a witch, and howls at the moon like a werewolf. Nothing works. She heads to a Halloween party dressed reluctantly as herself. When she arrives, her friends’ joyful screams reassure her that she’s great just as she is. Sadler’s message, though a familiar one, is delivered effectively in a charming, ghostly package. Misty truly is too precious to be frightening. Laberis depicts an endearingly spooky, all-animal cast—a frog witch, for instance, and a crocodilian mummy. Misty’s sidekick, a cheery little bat who lends support throughout, might be even more adorable than she is. Though Misty’s haunted house is filled with cobwebs and surrounded by jagged, leafless trees, the charming characters keep things from ever getting too frightening. The images will encourage lingering looks. Clearly, there’s plenty that makes Misty special just as she is—a takeaway that adults sharing the book with their little ones should be sure to drive home.
Too cute to be spooky indeed but most certainly sweet. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2024
ISBN: 9780593702901
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Rylant (Henry and Mudge and the Sneaky Crackers, 1998, etc.) slips into a sentimental mode for this latest outing of the boy and his dog, as she sends Mudge and Henry and his parents off on a camping trip. Each character is attended to, each personality sketched in a few brief words: Henry's mother is the camping veteran with outdoor savvy; Henry's father doesn't know a tent stake from a marshmallow fork, but he's got a guitar for campfire entertainment; and the principals are their usual ready-for-fun selves. There are sappy moments, e.g., after an evening of star- gazing, Rylant sends the family off to bed with: ``Everyone slept safe and sound and there were no bears, no scares. Just the clean smell of trees . . . and wonderful green dreams.'' With its nice tempo, the story is as toasty as its campfire and swaddled in Stevenson's trusty artwork. (Fiction. 6-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-689-81175-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1998
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