This story’s theme of self-reliance fails to adequately address keeping one’s hand out of purses (and pockets) that belong...
That mischievous handful known as Betty Bunny is back for her fifth exploration of the boundaries of acceptable bunny behavior.
In her previous escapades, Betty learned lessons in patience, accepting limits, honesty and persistence. These behaviors all come into play in this latest story when Betty attends an Easter egg hunt with her family. Her three older siblings help Betty find lots of eggs to put in her huge Easter basket, but Betty is dissatisfied with her impressive egg-gathering results because she didn’t actually find the eggs herself. She starts over and finds just three eggs on her own, taking pride in her solo accomplishment. This praiseworthy attitude is totally upended by the unfortunate conclusion, in which Betty gets into her mother’s purse and is caught taking money to buy an even bigger Easter basket. Betty’s rationalization for stealing is to repeat her parents’ earlier encouragement during the egg hunt: “It means so much more if I find it myself.” Funny, yes, but distressing too, as this is the end of the story. This latest caper may be just a bit too sassy for some adults, though others may consider it an acceptable teaching point. Betty and her family and friends are visually as charming as ever in cleverly detailed watercolor illustrations that bring the anthropomorphic rabbits to life.
This story’s theme of self-reliance fails to adequately address keeping one’s hand out of purses (and pockets) that belong to others. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Feb. 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-8037-4061-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2015
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Safe to creep on by.
Carle’s famous caterpillar expresses its love.
In three sentences that stretch out over most of the book’s 32 pages, the (here, at least) not-so-ravenous larva first describes the object of its love, then describes how that loved one makes it feel before concluding, “That’s why… / I[heart]U.” There is little original in either visual or textual content, much of it mined from The Very Hungry Caterpillar. “You are… / …so sweet,” proclaims the caterpillar as it crawls through the hole it’s munched in a strawberry; “…the cherry on my cake,” it says as it perches on the familiar square of chocolate cake; “…the apple of my eye,” it announces as it emerges from an apple. Images familiar from other works join the smiling sun that shone down on the caterpillar as it delivers assurances that “you make… / …the sun shine brighter / …the stars sparkle,” and so on. The book is small, only 7 inches high and 5 ¾ inches across when closed—probably not coincidentally about the size of a greeting card. While generations of children have grown up with the ravenous caterpillar, this collection of Carle imagery and platitudinous sentiment has little of his classic’s charm. The melding of Carle’s caterpillar with Robert Indiana’s iconic LOVE on the book’s cover, alas, draws further attention to its derivative nature.
Safe to creep on by. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Dec. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-448-48932-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
As ephemeral as a valentine.
Daywalt and Jeffers’ wandering crayons explore love.
Each double-page spread offers readers a vision of one of the anthropomorphic crayons on the left along with the statement “Love is [color].” The word love is represented by a small heart in the appropriate color. Opposite, childlike crayon drawings explain how that color represents love. So, readers learn, “love is green. / Because love is helpful.” The accompanying crayon drawing depicts two alligators, one holding a recycling bin and the other tossing a plastic cup into it, offering readers two ways of understanding green. Some statements are thought-provoking: “Love is white. / Because sometimes love is hard to see,” reaches beyond the immediate image of a cat’s yellow eyes, pink nose, and black mouth and whiskers, its white face and body indistinguishable from the paper it’s drawn on, to prompt real questions. “Love is brown. / Because sometimes love stinks,” on the other hand, depicted by a brown bear standing next to a brown, squiggly turd, may provoke giggles but is fundamentally a cheap laugh. Some of the color assignments have a distinctly arbitrary feel: Why is purple associated with the imagination and pink with silliness? Fans of The Day the Crayons Quit (2013) hoping for more clever, metaliterary fun will be disappointed by this rather syrupy read.
As ephemeral as a valentine. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Dec. 24, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5247-9268-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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