A new twist on a timeless classic for brand-new readers.
Clifford’s back for a BIG adventure!
Clifford the Big Red Dog, an iconic children’s-literature character since 1963, is making a reappearance on television and in books for children, complete with a new look and a new ability, one even more powerful than his big size and big heart. For the first time, Clifford and Emily Elizabeth can talk to each other and share stories. These two have always gone on adventures together, but their newfound communication honors the bonds many children have with their pets. It’s Birdwell Island’s birthday, and Clifford leads a special parade in the island’s honor, a parade that grows and grows as all the residents join in, bringing balloons, banners, and confetti. It’s a BIG, Clifford-sized parade! Birdwell Island is full of people of all shapes, sizes, and colors—embracing and celebrating inclusion and diversity. Themes of togetherness, celebration, collaboration, and community run deep through this book, and, if previous Clifford properties are any indication, they will through the forthcoming television show as well. Lively illustrations seek to honor the traditions of Clifford by including both the slightly rough and scratchy style Norman Bridwell brought to the original books as well as the smoother, brighter style of the previous TV show while also offering novel palette colors and facial features to characters new and old.
A new twist on a timeless classic for brand-new readers. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-338-57713-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Oct. 8, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
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. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Parent-child love and affection, appealingly presented, with the added attraction of the seasonal content and lack of gender...
A polar-bear parent speaks poetically of love for a child.
A genderless adult and cub travel through the landscapes of an arctic year. Each of the softly rendered double-page paintings has a very different feel and color palette as the pair go through the seasons, walking through wintry ice and snow and green summer meadows, cavorting in the blue ocean, watching whales, and playing beside musk oxen. The rhymes of the four-line stanzas are not forced, as is the case too often in picture books of this type: “When cold, winter winds / blow the leaves far and wide, / You’ll cross the great icebergs / with me by your side.” On a dark, snowy night, the loving parent says: “But for now, cuddle close / while the stars softly shine. // I’ll always be yours, / and you’ll always be mine.” As the last illustration shows the pair curled up for sleep, young listeners will be lulled to sweet dreams by the calm tenor of the pictures and the words. While far from original, this timeless theme is always in demand, and the combination of delightful illustrations and poetry that scans well make this a good choice for early-childhood classrooms, public libraries, and one-on-one home read-alouds.
Parent-child love and affection, appealingly presented, with the added attraction of the seasonal content and lack of gender restrictions. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-68010-070-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tiger Tales
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2017
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