Imagination and the magic of community togetherness join hands.
A child’s connection to the natural world results in an enchanted night.
On the drive to school, Arabella’s parents, after spotting a stag and a doe in a cornfield, repeat the stories they were once told by their grandparents. Mama and Papa note that deer can be “tricksters,” taking human shape to mingle with people. Later, Arabella impulsively invites the wild couple to the harvest dance, which the students are excitedly getting ready for. The deer just stare, but at the dance, a “lovely pair” of graceful strangers appear. Parents and children admire and wonder as the couple waltz. As they leave, they offer Arabella (and readers) a clue to their amazing secret. Preparing us for the spell ahead, Morel’s prose animates the setting: Autumn “trotted into the valley on frosty hooves”; “apples blushed red.” Her language is both poetic and deeply rooted in the real world of farm and forest: The deer’s coats are “the color of ash and earth; their ears, the shade of cow’s cream.” The farmyard setting is traditional, but refreshingly, Papa makes dinner while Arabella and Mama do the barn chores. Slightly stylized illustrations emphasize the tale’s timelessness: Some characters sport more modern clothes, while others look fairly old-fashioned. Miroslavova employs soft-edged lines drawn in muted, earthy colors; everything is autumnal. This unusual fall-themed book will attract both rural and urban romantics. Most characters are pale-skinned.
Imagination and the magic of community togetherness join hands. (Picture book. 6-9)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2025
ISBN: 9781534112865
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists.
How to raise money for a coveted poster: put your friends to work!
John, founder of the FUBU fashion line and a Shark Tank venture capitalist, offers a self-referential blueprint for financial success. Having only half of the $10 he needs for a Minka J poster, Daymond forks over $1 to buy a plain T-shirt, paints a picture of the pop star on it, sells it for $5, and uses all of his cash to buy nine more shirts. Then he recruits three friends to decorate them with his design and help sell them for an unspecified amount (from a conveniently free and empty street-fair booth) until they’re gone. The enterprising entrepreneur reimburses himself for the shirts and splits the remaining proceeds, which leaves him with enough for that poster as well as a “brand-new business book,” while his friends express other fiscal strategies: saving their share, spending it all on new art supplies, or donating part and buying a (math) book with the rest. (In a closing summation, the author also suggests investing in stocks, bonds, or cryptocurrency.) Though Miles cranks up the visual energy in her sparsely detailed illustrations by incorporating bright colors and lots of greenbacks, the actual advice feels a bit vague. Daymond is Black; most of the cast are people of color. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists. (Picture book. 7-9)Pub Date: March 21, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-56727-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
A fitting farewell, still funny, acute, and positive in its view of human nature even in its 37th episode.
A long-running series reaches its closing chapters.
Having, as Kline notes in her warm valedictory acknowledgements, taken 30 years to get through second and third grade, Harry Spooger is overdue to move on—but not just into fourth grade, it turns out, as his family is moving to another town as soon as the school year ends. The news leaves his best friend, narrator “Dougo,” devastated…particularly as Harry doesn’t seem all that fussed about it. With series fans in mind, the author takes Harry through a sort of last-day-of-school farewell tour. From his desk he pulls a burned hot dog and other items that featured in past episodes, says goodbye to Song Lee and other classmates, and even (for the first time ever) leads Doug and readers into his house and memento-strewn room for further reminiscing. Of course, Harry isn’t as blasé about the move as he pretends, and eyes aren’t exactly dry when he departs. But hardly is he out of sight before Doug is meeting Mohammad, a new neighbor from Syria who (along with further diversifying a cast that began as mostly white but has become increasingly multiethnic over the years) will also be starting fourth grade at summer’s end, and planning a written account of his “horrible” buddy’s exploits. Finished illustrations not seen.
A fitting farewell, still funny, acute, and positive in its view of human nature even in its 37th episode. (Fiction. 7-9)Pub Date: Nov. 27, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-451-47963-1
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2018
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