Fascinating in scope, admirable for clarity: a winner.
Emberley tracks a loving mom’s text message to her child on its secondslong global journey.
The narrative begins with receipt by the sleeping child’s “two little ears.” The message glows on the phone’s glass surface, “radiating out as billions of electromagnetic photons.” Cells in the eyes detect the photons and translate their message as an electrical signal, which travels through hollow nerve cells filled with salty fluid, “straight to the brain.” Italicized science facts augment the narration: Cannily, Emberley analogizes humans’ ability to conduct electricity through nerves and salt with machined infrastructure that does so via copper wire. Emberley uses the child’s return text to further examine the brain’s neural interactivity with the phone, then broadens the overview to unpack the complex, fascinating STEM systems that support modern global communications. Emberley deftly illuminates their basics with clear language, labeled illustrations, and ongoing respect for child readers. Signature, loose-lined pictures often show both under- and aboveground activity. Rabbits scamper in tunnels as kids swing on a playground; underground cabling snakes along, unseen. Details deftly enhance child appeal. Cellphone towers are sometimes disguised as trees to blend in with local landscapes. The locations of undersea cable landings are kept “as secret as possible, to prevent sabotage,” and the cables’ “protective armor” can withstand a shark bite. Child and mother both have pale skin and straight, dark hair. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Fascinating in scope, admirable for clarity: a winner. (author’s note, information resources) (Informational picture book. 6-9)Pub Date: Oct. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5344-5290-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Caitlyn Dlouhy/Atheneum
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
More thoughtful, sometimes exhilarating encounters with nature.
In a new entry in the Over and Under series, a paddleboarder glimpses humpback whales leaping, floats over a populous kelp forest, and explores life on a beach and in a tide pool.
In this tale inspired by Messner’s experiences in Monterey Bay in California, a young tan-skinned narrator, along with their light-skinned mom and tan-skinned dad, observes in quiet, lyrical language sights and sounds above and below the sea’s serene surface. Switching perspectives and angles of view and often leaving the family’s red paddleboards just tiny dots bobbing on distant swells, Neal’s broad seascapes depict in precise detail bat stars and anchovies, kelp bass, and sea otters going about their business amid rocky formations and the swaying fronds of kelp…and, further out, graceful moon jellies and—thrillingly—massive whales in open waters beneath gliding pelicans and other shorebirds. After returning to the beach at day’s end to search for shells and to spot anemones and decorator crabs, the child ends with nighttime dreams of stars in the sky meeting stars in the sea. Appended nature notes on kelp and 21 other types of sealife fill in details about patterns and relationships in this rich ecosystem. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
More thoughtful, sometimes exhilarating encounters with nature. (author’s note, further reading) (Informational picture book. 6-9)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-79720-347-8
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses.
An NBA star pays tribute to the influence of his grandfather.
In the same vein as his Long Shot (2009), illustrated by Frank Morrison, this latest from Paul prioritizes values and character: “My granddad Papa Chilly had dreams that came true,” he writes, “so maybe if I listen and watch him, / mine will too.” So it is that the wide-eyed Black child in the simply drawn illustrations rises early to get to the playground hoops before anyone else, watches his elder working hard and respecting others, hears him cheering along with the rest of the family from the stands during games, and recalls in a prose afterword that his grandfather wasn’t one to lecture but taught by example. Paul mentions in both the text and the backmatter that Papa Chilly was the first African American to own a service station in North Carolina (his presumed dream) but not that he was killed in a robbery, which has the effect of keeping the overall tone positive and the instructional content one-dimensional. Figures in the pictures are mostly dark-skinned. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-250-81003-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
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