Keep plugging, follow your muse, find your right fit in the world. Fine sentiments, though they might need a little more...
Arnold’s story app of a cow trying to find her calling is minimalist in every way, except some handsome artwork from Manders.
Lily, a bit of a freethinking, free-hoofing bovine living on a farm in Wisconsin, has an inkling that her hooves were made for more than support in the milking stall. Soon it will be her turn to take her Grandmoo’s place as the “bell cow,” the leader of the herd, but where Lily goes, chaos reigns. Surely, somewhere in the world, there is a place for a dancing bell cow. So off she ambles, in search of her calling. As Lily makes her world tour, Manders provides good scenic backdrops, but Lily is a klutz. Whatever she tries, she gives up right away. Until, that is, the conga crosses her path, a basic step-and-thrust with which even the most challenged cow can find the rhythm. For all the gumption Lily shows in taking to the wide-open road from her little farm in Wisconsin, it’s too bad she’s such a milquetoast when confronted with the flamenco, the tap dance or even the Senegalese stilt dance. The translation from Arnold’s 2004 traditional book to interactive app adds little beyond rudimentary animations and sound effects. A puzzle game offers three levels of difficulty.
Keep plugging, follow your muse, find your right fit in the world. Fine sentiments, though they might need a little more nerve than Lily is willing to give. (iPad storybook app. 5-8)Pub Date: Jan. 15, 2013
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Fat Red Couch
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
A gleeful game for budding naturalists.
Artfully cropped animal portraits challenge viewers to guess which end they’re seeing.
In what will be a crowd-pleasing and inevitably raucous guessing game, a series of close-up stock photos invite children to call out one of the titular alternatives. A page turn reveals answers and basic facts about each creature backed up by more of the latter in a closing map and table. Some of the posers, like the tail of an okapi or the nose on a proboscis monkey, are easy enough to guess—but the moist nose on a star-nosed mole really does look like an anus, and the false “eyes” on the hind ends of a Cuyaba dwarf frog and a Promethea moth caterpillar will fool many. Better yet, Lavelle saves a kicker for the finale with a glimpse of a small parasitical pearlfish peeking out of a sea cucumber’s rear so that the answer is actually face and butt. “Animal identification can be tricky!” she concludes, noting that many of the features here function as defenses against attack: “In the animal world, sometimes your butt will save your face and your face just might save your butt!” (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A gleeful game for budding naturalists. (author’s note) (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: July 11, 2023
ISBN: 9781728271170
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks eXplore
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2023
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
