bookshelf

ONE LITTLE MONSTER

Name: ONE LITTLE MONSTER
Author: Mark Gonyea
ISBN: 978-1-5344-0674-2

by Mark Gonyea ; illustrated by Mark Gonyea ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 24, 2018

Would that all children could greet their own monsters with this much aplomb.

bookshelf

What starts as one little monster on a child’s windowsill quickly gets out of hand.

To give credit where it’s due, the child handles the situation with remarkable self-possession. “I’m cozy in bed, and what do I see? // 1 little monster staring at me. / I say to myself, / What harm could it do? / I only blinked once… // But now I see 2!” Page turn by page turn, the monsters continue to add up, gross-out humor arriving with No. 3, a green, mucous-y one sneezed out of monster No. 2, and with No. 5: “One cuts the cheese.” But when the count reaches 10, the monsters have a new look in their eyes and postures: fear. This 10th creature is different from the others, lacking the clean, sharp lines of the rest. In fact, it looks distinctly like a sock puppet with drawn-on, staring eyes and scowling mouth. The clever child gets to enjoy that cozy bed at last…at least until monsters populate dreamland. The bold, simple shapes and bright colors of Gonyea’s digital illustrations are clear when the monsters are few and obviously, uh, monster-shaped. But as the pages fill with oddly shaped blobs, some of which lack even facial features, it becomes increasingly difficult to parse the illustrations, especially when they are close-ups.

Would that all children could greet their own monsters with this much aplomb. (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: July 24, 2018

ISBN: 978-1-5344-0674-2

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Aladdin

Review Posted Online: July 15, 2018

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S PARANORMAL & SUPERNATURAL

- BOOK REVIEW
THE SPOOKY BOX
by Mark Gonyea ; illustrated by Mark Gonyea

- BOOK REVIEW
A BOOK ABOUT COLOR
by Mark Gonyea & illustrated by Mark Gonyea

- BOOK REVIEW
ANOTHER BOOK ABOUT DESIGN
by Mark Gonyea & illustrated by Mark Gonyea

bookshelf

ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

bookshelf

Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)

Pub Date: June 21, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
ON THE FIRST DAY OF FIRST GRADE
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Sarah Jennings

- BOOK REVIEW
FIVE LITTLE BUNNIES
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Dan Yaccarino

bookshelf

A BIKE LIKE SERGIO'S

by Maribeth Boelts ; illustrated by Noah Z. Jones ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 4, 2016

Embedded in this heartwarming story of doing the right thing is a deft examination of the pressures of income inequality on...

bookshelf

Continuing from their acclaimed Those Shoes (2007), Boelts and Jones entwine conversations on money, motives, and morality.

This second collaboration between author and illustrator is set within an urban multicultural streetscape, where brown-skinned protagonist Ruben wishes for a bike like his friend Sergio’s. He wishes, but Ruben knows too well the pressure his family feels to prioritize the essentials. While Sergio buys a pack of football cards from Sonny’s Grocery, Ruben must buy the bread his mom wants. A familiar lady drops what Ruben believes to be a $1 bill, but picking it up, to his shock, he discovers $100! Is this Ruben’s chance to get himself the bike of his dreams? In a fateful twist, Ruben loses track of the C-note and is sent into a panic. After finally finding it nestled deep in a backpack pocket, he comes to a sense of moral clarity: “I remember how it was for me when that money that was hers—then mine—was gone.” When he returns the bill to her, the lady offers Ruben her blessing, leaving him with double-dipped emotions, “happy and mixed up, full and empty.” Readers will be pleased that there’s no reward for Ruben’s choice of integrity beyond the priceless love and warmth of a family’s care and pride.

Embedded in this heartwarming story of doing the right thing is a deft examination of the pressures of income inequality on children. (Picture book. 5-8)