Children will be amused by the relationship and intrigued with the technique, comprehending that one can draw with a pencil...
Amato’s debut features two writing tools with opposing dispositions: a yellow pencil and a pink, stand-alone eraser.
One likes to make marks; the other delights in eradication. Can this end well? Clean, white backgrounds set the stage for opening strokes and smudges easily removed. The eraser exhibits confidence, but the writing implement picks up speed, creating—in rapid succession—an impudent caricature of its nemesis, a cyclone, an army of menacing pencils, and a forest that becomes so thick it’s essentially solid black. Stumped, the eraser eventually swipes at the darkness. Although the attempts leave residual texture, the effect is pleasing. A sun created by erasing leads to a galaxy, and the neatnik eraser directs a newly hewn rocket onto a fresh page, exclaiming, “Eat my dust!” Soon, however, the devilish drawer is at it again. The eraser’s response—rubbed-away letters forming the book’s title—reveals that this strategy brings peace with the duo’s differences (and that their interactions are actually enjoyed). Employing a controlled palette for the digitally manipulated photographs and hand drawings, Amato maintains interest by animating a few deft lines into ever changing facial expressions and by varying the page designs from panels to full spreads. Surprisingly, the pencil doesn’t have any lines to speak; the eraser does all the talking, albeit in brief comments.
Children will be amused by the relationship and intrigued with the technique, comprehending that one can draw with a pencil and an eraser—and that opposites can co-exist. (Picture book. 3-9)Pub Date: Jan. 29, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-545-82931-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A charming friendship story and great setup for future books.
Curious about the Big Wide World outside his Sasquatch community, Hugo makes a friend who is of it.
Sasquatch Hugo’s bedroom is inside a cave and possesses the charming feature of a small stream running through it that he can sail his little toy boat on. It’s cool, but he yearns to see the Big Wide World. When he asks his smart friend Gigi if a Sasquatch might become a sailor, she says it’s possible but would be difficult—the primary rule of their people is to not be seen by Humans. Then, in everyone’s favorite Hide and Go Sneak class, which is held outside, a Human appears; Hugo laughs at the sight, drawing Human attention in a taboo-breaking mistake. Shortly after, Hugo’s toy boat floats into the cave with a Human toy—soon, it’s facilitating a pen-pal–type relationship that’s derailed when Hugo confesses to being a Sasquatch and Human Boone, a budding cryptozoologist, doesn’t believe him. How Hugo and Boone resolve this misapprehension and become friends in a joint search for the Ogopogo concludes this series opener. Potter keeps the third-person narrative tightly focused on Hugo’s perspective, and the details she uses to flesh out the Sasquatch world are delightfully playful. Sala’s drawings depict a homey Sasquatch cavern community, Boone as a freckled, white boy, and Hugo as a hairily benevolent behemoth.
A charming friendship story and great setup for future books. (final art unseen) (Fantasy. 5-9)Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4197-2859-4
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2018
Wild and wacky.
A picture book from the comedy duo known as Rhett & Link, creators of the online juggernaut Good Mythical Morning.
Lumo is obsessed with chicken fingers; Saffy, who is new to town and anxious about starting school, finds comfort in the only food she likes: buttered spaghetti. The night before the first day of school, a thunderstorm rages, and each kid makes a wish—“to have chicken fingers at school,” in Lumo’s case; Saffy wishes for “the first thing off the top of her head: buttered spaghetti.” File under “Be careful what you wish for.” Lumo’s and Saffy’s respective physical changes (chicken fingers for fingers, spaghetti for hair) make navigating school a challenge but bring them together in the cafeteria, where they enjoy some new foods—and their new friendship. The plotting could have been sharper: Why do the kids’ bodies suddenly return to normal? And couldn’t the authors have thought up a less old-hat story-ending punch line? Nevertheless, McLaughlin and Neal get by on their charm, and the plot sets up some funny visuals. Salcedo’s cartoony Photoshop art features well-chosen artifacts from a typical kid’s life and captures the mortification of not fitting in, which will be familiar even to readers who have never experienced breaded fingers or noodle hair. Lumo is brown-skinned and dark-haired; Saffy is pale-skinned with disheveled reddish-brown hair.
Wild and wacky. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: June 16, 2026
ISBN: 9780063474154
Page Count: 32
Publisher: HarperPop/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2026
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