Casanova turns in something different with this lyrical look at an island’s start to a brand new day.
There is no plot, just a series of island vignettes that are sometimes beautiful in their simplicity, the typesetting of the words on the pages at times echoing their meanings: “Pine trees s t r e t c h / their limbs and branches.” Precise words introduce nature vocabulary to little listeners—dangle, plunge, gargle, shimmy—and paint word pictures: “Heron swoops, / a two-stilt statue.” And the island is filled with the flora and fauna of the north woods: deer, moose, spider, loon, mallards, bees. Greens, blues, and browns dominate Wroblewski’s woodcuts. The ravens and chickadees are so close to realistic they might fly away, the heron’s feathers are gorgeously detailed, and the bear and red squirrel scenes might be artwork on a wall. Other times, though, the illustrations are a miss—the opening spread of water and sky is unrealistic to the point of being abstract, and the closing picture uses the same sky. The addition of “you,” a blond, white child who wakes up, eats breakfast, and rushes out to explore the world, can be seen as intruding on the natural scene, and Wroblewski’s close-up of this child is wooden and almost ugly.
A mixed bag, to be sure, but for those children living near these island oases, there is much that will seem familiar. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Feb. 24, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8166-8935-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Univ. of Minnesota
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2016
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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Hee haw.
11
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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. 29, 2018
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS
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Rhymed couplets convey the story of a girl who likes to build things but is shy about it. Neither the poetry nor Rosie’s projects always work well.
Rosie picks up trash and oddments where she finds them, stashing them in her attic room to work on at night. Once, she made a hat for her favorite zookeeper uncle to keep pythons away, and he laughed so hard that she never made anything publicly again. But when her great-great-aunt Rose comes to visit and reminds Rosie of her own past building airplanes, she expresses her regret that she still has not had the chance to fly. Great-great-aunt Rose is visibly modeled on Rosie the Riveter, the iconic, red-bandanna–wearing poster woman from World War II. Rosie decides to build a flying machine and does so (it’s a heli-o-cheese-copter), but it fails. She’s just about to swear off making stuff forever when Aunt Rose congratulates her on her failure; now she can go on to try again. Rosie wears her hair swooped over one eye (just like great-great-aunt Rose), and other figures have exaggerated hairdos, tiny feet and elongated or greatly rounded bodies. The detritus of Rosie’s collections is fascinating, from broken dolls and stuffed animals to nails, tools, pencils, old lamps and possibly an erector set. And cheddar-cheese spray.
Earnest and silly by turns, it doesn’t quite capture the attention or the imagination, although surely its heart is in the right place. (historical note) (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4197-0845-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2013
Categories: CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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