Louise is a feisty gal with the best of intentions. She just “accidentally a-little-bit” messes everything up.
Louise Trapeze is back (Louise Trapeze Is Totally 100% Fearless, 2015), longing to be more mature than ever.
Everyone at the Sweet Potato Traveling Circus Troupe has a job to do. Everyone, that is, except Louise. She does have a few Important Circus Jobs that she shares with her best friend, Stella, but it is not the same as having her very own grown-up responsibility. So she sets off to prove how dependable she can be. Earnest mistakes, such as causing a large “spaghetti-mountain spill” or putting too much oil on Clara Bear’s unicycle, pile up. But perhaps babysitting the juggling chickens will be her chance. All she needs to do is feed them a small snack while their trainer is gone. What could possibly go wrong? As Louise says—“Cheeze Louise and holy trapeze!”—oh so much. Luckily, Louise learns that asking for help is sometimes the most responsible, grown-up thing one can do. While the well-meaning little girl who makes mistakes and has idiosyncratic speech patterns is hardly new to the shelves, the circus setting distinguishes Ostow’s offering. Purple accents in the design and Barrager’s squiggle sketch vignettes enliven this second big-top tale, though they display very little ethnic variation among the troupe.
Louise is a feisty gal with the best of intentions. She just “accidentally a-little-bit” messes everything up. (Fiction. 6-9)Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-553-49743-4
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Making the rules rules! (Fiction. 6-9)
It’s spring break, and Bean’s big sister, Nancy, is off to Monkey Park, where she’ll get to spend every day having secret, big-kid fun at Girl Power 4-Ever Camp for girls 11-14. Bean is 7.
No way is Bean attending Puppet Fun! She and Ivy can make their own fun. After a false start (one board does not a tree house make; some things are beyond even duct tape’s powers), Ivy has a brilliant idea, and Camp Flaming Arrow is born. When their moms let these small agents of chaos visit the park on their own, readers will know what to expect. Nancy’s camp offers Crafts, Dance and First Aid; so does Ivy and Bean’s—with a difference. Their friendship bracelets turn into chains binding Houdini hand and foot. Their tap dancing (stick thumbtacks into shoe soles, climb onto old metal wash tub and voilà!) is more fun than a silly old dance routine—louder anyway. Their First Aid, with the help of fake blood and bandages, morphs into a game of Zombies among the Puppet Fun kids. Quickly acquiring an enthusiastic following, the two inventive camp counselors give a whole new meaning to Girl Power. As usual, Blackall’s art conveys the girls’ anarchically imaginative glee, bringing the mischief and mayhem to messy, hilarious life.
Making the rules rules! (Fiction. 6-9)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4521-0295-5
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: April 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2012
BOOK TO SCREEN
A solid exploration of a resonant musical partnership at a historically significant moment in American music.
This married author-illustrator team (Light in the Darkness, 2013, etc.) here highlights the innovative, barrier-breaking collaboration of African-American Wilson and Jewish-American Goodman.
Cline-Ransome’s staccato verse narrative articulates the musicians’ parallel paths to their eventual collaboration. She contrasts their backgrounds, describing dedicated musical training, early jazz influences and stints in various bands. (Wilson, the son of Tuskegee educators, studied music theory in college in Alabama, while Goodman got free synagogue music lessons and gigged around Chicago, quitting school at 14.) The two are introduced in Queens, N.Y., in 1935 and click during an impromptu jam. Benny forms a trio with Wilson and drummer Gene Krupa, overcoming—in April 1936 in Chicago—an initial reluctance to appear with Wilson, making them the first interracial band to perform in public. That same year, vibraphonist Lionel Hampton joins up, making it a quartet. Ransome’s watercolors utilize a palette rich in twilight-blue, indigo and yellow, punctuated with sienna, red and green. In lively double-page spreads, he captures the band’s dedication to practicing and recording together, as well as the verve and excitement of their live shows. Two pages of background notes include more about the musicians, a timeline of jazz events and a brief “Who’s Who” of some of jazz’s giants.
A solid exploration of a resonant musical partnership at a historically significant moment in American music. (Informational picture book. 6-9)Pub Date: April 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-8234-2362-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Feb. 25, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2014
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