A stronger message and more coherent magic would have made this charming story even more appealing.
This contemporary eco-fable suffers from a lack of internal logic, but the positive message and attractive retro artwork may still find favor with progressive parents.
Joey and Chloe, two round-eyed, round-headed tykes, arrive home one day to find their parents packing. The fog in Foggytown, they say, has gotten too thick, and it’s time to move. Unhappy at the prospect of leaving their beloved home, Chloe and Joey both wish that the house could come with them—and, in a surreal sequence, it does. The house’s friends, including the schoolhouse, library and a row of friendly streetlights come along. The animated house is a particularly appealing character with black arms and legs and bright-red paint that stands out well against the generally grey and blue backgrounds. Siegel’s artwork varies from smoky sepia-toned silhouettes to crisply drawn vignettes to cartoon-style full-color double-page spreads. The text, while lengthy and occasionally didactic, has a pleasing flow and offers several lovely images, including “the warm spot on the kitchen floor where we drink our milks every morning” and the “long vrooming hallway.” What’s less effective is the characterization of the factory’s output as “fog” rather than smog, the family’s decision to move away from the problem not solve it and the arbitrariness of the house’s sudden mobility.
A stronger message and more coherent magic would have made this charming story even more appealing. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Sept. 27, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-59643-635-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2011
Read for the overall aesthetic and for the text’s gentle humor.
A girl named Willow learns from a friend “inside [her] head” how to unlock her imagination when rereading a book.
Advice opposite the title page is an immediate hint about the approaching dreamlike quality of the text and the illustrations: “Read slowly, then… / Close your eyes / See the images / Savor the wor(l)d / Imagine the future / Feel the colors / Hear the sounds / Smell the paper / Touch the story / Enjoy.” The title page features the same gnomish, whiskered old man who, on the cover, gazes up at a girl on a carousel horse. As the page turns, readers learn that he is Tally, a gruff voice inside Willow’s head, advising her to end boredom by reading. When Willow protest that she’s read all of her books, Tally advises her to look for the “book inside the book.” There is a design flaw here: The stack of sentences in quotation marks does not clarify who is speaking, which may tie readers in knots. Under Tally’s tutelage, Willow embarks on a fantastical journey, flying above and into storybook scenes. The fantasy elements of the artwork are stunningly beautiful and subtly evocative of different centuries of Western artwork and literature. Unfortunately, inconsistent depiction of Willow’s apparent age is distracting.
Read for the overall aesthetic and for the text’s gentle humor. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-988-8240-80-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: minedition
Review Posted Online: July 28, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2014
Little Known Fact: lots of cheery text, exclamation marks and trendy electronic devices do not necessarily add up to a...
Santa’s head elf delivers an hour-by-hour report as he and two other male elves assist Santa with his Christmas Eve deliveries, as well as an emergency delivery on Christmas morning.
This 21st-century elf uses a smartphone, takes “elfies” and communicates with the North Pole with a phone headset. Santa needs his head elf to keep him on track to get through the night, so the elf urges him along with a text: “Time to fly, big guy!” Each page indicates the number of hours left until Christmas morning along with the sleigh’s current location, problems solved and a feature called “Little Known Facts.” For example, “Santa loves dogs and dogs love Santa.” The deliveries are completed by sunrise, but Santa and the elves find a stowaway dog named Tugboat hiding in the bottom of the toy bag, necessitating a return trip. The story tries hard to be humorous and up-to-the-minute, but it is neither new nor particularly funny. Cartoon-style illustrations are adequate but also rather pedestrian. Mrs. Claus is the only female character, holding a tray with hot chocolate and yelling at the menfolk to do the right thing. A 21st-century Mrs. Claus might grab some gal-pal elves and return that dog herself. Although the elves are all male, the general elf crew is multiethnic, and the head, protagonist elf has warm, brown skin and straight black hair—perhaps he's Asian or Latino. In any event, he and his brethren represent a step forward for ethnic elf diversity.
Little Known Fact: lots of cheery text, exclamation marks and trendy electronic devices do not necessarily add up to a successful Christmas story. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-58536-910-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2014
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