A charming, emotionally resonant exploration of the oh-so-important concept of “best friend.” (Picture book. 3-7)
A little bunny attends a sleepover birthday party at her best friend’s house and discovers she may not be Olive’s only “best friend.”
“[B]est bunny friends” Sophie and Olive enjoy snacking on carrots, cabbage and kale. They like wearing bracelets, bows and tiaras. They play jump-rope, hopscotch, tag and pingpong. So when Olive invites Sophie to her birthday sleepover, Sophie’s “happy from the tops of her ears to the tips of her toes” but surprised when another bunny named Penelope answers Olive’s door and announces she’s Olive’s best friend. Since Sophie thought she was Olive’s best friend, she’s confused and feels slighted. Eventually, Sophie and Penelope confront Olive about which is her best friend, and Olive tells them you can have more than one best friend. Skeptical, Penelope and Sophie can’t fall asleep until they confess to each other this is their first sleepover and they miss their favorite dolls. After this confidential exchange, Sophie decides Olive may be right. Simple, flat, pastel-hued gouache illustrations exude an innocent cheer as they progress from Olive and Sophie’s apparently exclusive friendship to Olive’s more expansive perspective with her two best friends, Sophie and Penelope.
A charming, emotionally resonant exploration of the oh-so-important concept of “best friend.” (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: March 18, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-59643-933-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Neal Porter/Roaring Brook
Review Posted Online: Dec. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2014
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Parent-child love and affection, appealingly presented, with the added attraction of the seasonal content and lack of gender...
A polar-bear parent speaks poetically of love for a child.
A genderless adult and cub travel through the landscapes of an arctic year. Each of the softly rendered double-page paintings has a very different feel and color palette as the pair go through the seasons, walking through wintry ice and snow and green summer meadows, cavorting in the blue ocean, watching whales, and playing beside musk oxen. The rhymes of the four-line stanzas are not forced, as is the case too often in picture books of this type: “When cold, winter winds / blow the leaves far and wide, / You’ll cross the great icebergs / with me by your side.” On a dark, snowy night, the loving parent says: “But for now, cuddle close / while the stars softly shine. // I’ll always be yours, / and you’ll always be mine.” As the last illustration shows the pair curled up for sleep, young listeners will be lulled to sweet dreams by the calm tenor of the pictures and the words. While far from original, this timeless theme is always in demand, and the combination of delightful illustrations and poetry that scans well make this a good choice for early-childhood classrooms, public libraries, and one-on-one home read-alouds.
Parent-child love and affection, appealingly presented, with the added attraction of the seasonal content and lack of gender restrictions. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-68010-070-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tiger Tales
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2017
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
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