Mark always swings for the seats even when a single will help his team. His favorite player is Hank Aaron, who is closing in on Babe Ruth’s record of 714 career home runs. He’s even lucky enough to witness Aarons’s 700th home run and to meet him afterward. Hank kindly imparts some hitting advice, and later sends Mark a book about hitting. At the beginning of the next season, Aaron sets the new record and Mark is there to see it, too. Predictably, even as his hero makes history, his own hitting skills improve, and he becomes a better player. Leonetti sacrifices narrative ease to didacticism, causing Mark’s narration to be generally stilted and lifeless, the only slight exception being the description of Aaron’s record-breaking game. Kim’s bright, double-page spreads add some zest to the text. An afterword that provides biographical information about Aaron contains a puzzling error, stating that the Negro Leagues in 1951 were the only venue for African-American ballplayers even as it trumpets Jackie Robinson’s 1947 entry into the Major Leagues. Disappointing. (bibliography) (Picture book. 8-10)
Pub Date: April 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-8118-5662-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
PLB 0-688-16508-7 Buckley’s Josie, first spotted in 1962, is as sprightly as ever in Ormerod’s illustrations, nimbly eluding her family’s search. As Josie’s mother, father, and brother go looking for her around the house, they are accompanied by the musical wordplay: “Did she go inside the house—rosy house, posy house? Did she go inside the house? Is that where Josie is?” Readers can search along with Josie’s family, and will spy Josie’s legs under the table or behind a coat. Ormerod’s artwork is winsome, although the literalness of her visual narrative confines the poetry rather than liberating it. Yet the pulse of Buckley’s words is bewitching, and readers may even want to take them outside and jump rope to their beat: “Look! Is that a rosy nose, a dozy nose, a posy nose? And do you see two ribbon bows? Can you count? Are there ten toes?” (Picture book. 2-7)
Pub Date: April 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-688-16507-9
Page Count: 24
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Music has the capacity to make friends of enemies, in this quiet study of one introverted fellow: Mole. Mole spends his days alone in his underground hovel, until one night while eating supper in front of the television, he hears the sweet sound of a violin. “I want to make beautiful music, too,” Mole claims, then sends away for a violin of his own. One note leads to another, and his music goes from screeching to symphonic. Unbeknownst to him, his years of underground practice have overarching effects, seen by readers only in the illustrations. Lilting strains of music attract birds, farmers, presidents, and queens. Mole’s subterranean world, a realm of permanent night, is softly lit by glowing umber, while outside, fighting armies lay down their arms as the music plays on. With endearing characterizations stylistically akin to Arnold Lobel’s Frog and Toad, the beloved Mole will easily win the affections of readers and inspire young hopes for a better world. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-8050-2819-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1999
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