A bland take on a premise that Mercer Mayer has practically worn out single-handedly.
Unexceptional writing and low-wattage interactive effects send this tale of a girl and her closet monster to a back shelf.
Chloe is drawn with huge, almond eyes and placed against pastel backgrounds. She explains to readers how she cuddles, cleans up after and cares for her spidery, rubber-limbed companion (anonymous, until he’s abruptly introduced near the end as “Floyd”) before anticlimactically revealing the “little secret” that he is her friend—a fact which she had previously mentioned anyway on the second screen. Toothy Floyd is appealing, with his little horns and big, googly eyes, and he makes a variety of amusing noises when he is tapped, from Donald Duck–like mutterings to gentle boinks. Unfortunately, he is not enough to sustain even this short app. The story, which is intermittently rhymed, is read by a slightly breathless narrator in both manual and autoplay modes. Selecting the latter freezes the skimpy assortment of animations and tap-activated sound effects. The app opens with an advertisement (readers may skip past it), closes on a screen that does not allow backward swiping, and features neither a thumbnail index nor a way to set a bookmark.
A bland take on a premise that Mercer Mayer has practically worn out single-handedly. (iPad storybook app. 6-8)Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2014
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Marina Tito
Review Posted Online: Feb. 25, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2014
The wriggly narrator of Diary of a Worm (2003) puts in occasional appearances, but it’s his arachnid buddy who takes center stage here, with terse, tongue-in-cheek comments on his likes (his close friend Fly, Charlotte’s Web), his dislikes (vacuums, people with big feet), nervous encounters with a huge Daddy Longlegs, his extended family—which includes a Grandpa more than willing to share hard-won wisdom (The secret to a long, happy life: “Never fall asleep in a shoe.”)—and mishaps both at spider school and on the human playground. Bliss endows his garden-dwellers with faces and the odd hat or other accessory, and creates cozy webs or burrows colorfully decorated with corks, scraps, plastic toys and other human detritus. Spider closes with the notion that we could all get along, “just like me and Fly,” if we but got to know one another. Once again, brilliantly hilarious. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-06-000153-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Joanna Cotler/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2005
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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