The team behind The World Is Full of Babies! (1996) allows readers to fly along with the child narrator on the back of a migrating goose. Once at the nesting ground, the geese lay their eggs; over the summer the goslings grow from little squirts to loud honkers. At the end of the season the geese and the girl head south, avoiding telephone wires and hunters' bullets. Ultimately the girl lands back in her soft, warm bed (with a comforter and pillow that look suspiciously downy). The watercolors are friendly and flighty, and facts on the last spread (ostensibly from the book the girl was reading before she fell asleep and dreamed the adventure) take care of questions that might arise from the tale. (Picture book. 4-7)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1997
ISBN: 0-7534-5103-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Kingfisher
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1997
Jeffers returns to illustrating Brown (Baby Animals, 1989) as she sets four previously unpublished poems to bright, crisply detailed outdoor scenes featuring an animated teddy bear investigating an idyllic natural world. In the first, a sort of companion piece to Runaway Bunny, Bear toddles off into a field of tall May flowers, but sings to a left-behind parent that though distances may separate them, "It's a long time that I'll love you, / Never, never go away." The bear/child then bends down to examine a world in which "little things creep / In their green grass forests deep . . . ." Next he experiences as much as hears "The Song of Wind and Rain," and finally finishes with an excursion along a river bank to watch little boats go "Slow slow / In the soft fall of the snow." Though Jeffers confesses that she isn't sure whether Brown considered these rough drafts or finished pieces, they read smoothly enough, and the lovely pictures make them into small stories that capture their sense as well as their depth of feeling perfectly. (Picture book. 5-7)
Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-7868-0509-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Hyperion
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2001
As Winter Lullaby (1998) gives way to a new season, snow melts from highlands, reeds grow in wetlands, new grass shoots up, and cottonwoods bud, signaling the reappearance of bears and skunks, the call of frogs, the construction of new nests and tunnels. Alternating double-paged spreads show the wide sweep of a setting, then the animal that lives in it. Newbold's landscapes and wildlife portraits, all rendered in crisp detail and strong, sculpted-looking lines, seem to explode past the edges of the page, matching the rhythmic force of Seuling's rhymed question and answer text: "When reeds grow across the marshy wetlands, what do bullfrogs do?" [turn the page] "Croak the light long / their mating song." Seuling and Newbold play this seasonal wake-up tune with nary a false note. (Picture book. 4-6)
Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-15-202317-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
