An enjoyable tale emphasizing the importance of tackling challenges with an effective mindset.
In this picture book from a father-and-daughter team, two children share a helpful life lesson after explaining the different ways that cows and buffaloes deal with storms.
Jai and Kara point out that Colorado is one of the only places hospitable to both cows and buffaloes. In East Colorado, the land is so flat, you “see all the way to the horizon.” When cows spot “a storm rolling in,” they “gather in a herd and run away.” But because they don’t run very fast, the tempest “quickly overtakes them,” making an escape difficult. Buffaloes handle storms more effectively. They “gather in a herd and run into the storm at full gallop…easier and quicker.” Jai and Kara clarify that while both animals “face the same storm…how they react…makes all the difference.” Like Colorado’s tempests, life’s challenges are inevitable, and the girls suggest: “BE THE BUFFALO!” The Joneses’ short but informative story implores readers to emulate buffaloes’ efficient, head-on technique when confronting their own problems. While some youngsters may be disturbed by the cows’ distress during the storm, older readers may see beyond the literal interpretations and understand how the narrators’ comparisons underscore constructive coping and problem-solving. TullipStudio’s full-color, cartoonish illustrations depict the dark-skinned girls visiting the animals. The Colorado backdrops include trees, mountains, and blue skies. The animals have large, round eyes and animated faces, such as worried expressions when the tempest approaches.
An enjoyable tale emphasizing the importance of tackling challenges with an effective mindset.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Manuscript
Review Posted Online: March 21, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs.
The Heffley family’s house undergoes a disastrous attempt at home improvement.
When Great Aunt Reba dies, she leaves some money to the family. Greg’s mom calls a family meeting to determine what to do with their share, proposing home improvements and then overruling the family’s cartoonish wish lists and instead pushing for an addition to the kitchen. Before bringing in the construction crew, the Heffleys attempt to do minor maintenance and repairs themselves—during which Greg fails at the work in various slapstick scenes. Once the professionals are brought in, the problems keep getting worse: angry neighbors, terrifying problems in walls, and—most serious—civil permitting issues that put the kibosh on what work’s been done. Left with only enough inheritance to patch and repair the exterior of the house—and with the school’s dismal standardized test scores as a final straw—Greg’s mom steers the family toward moving, opening up house-hunting and house-selling storylines (and devastating loyal Rowley, who doesn’t want to lose his best friend). While Greg’s positive about the move, he’s not completely uncaring about Rowley’s action. (And of course, Greg himself is not as unaffected as he wishes.) The gags include effectively placed callbacks to seemingly incidental events (the “stress lizard” brought in on testing day is particularly funny) and a lampoon of after-school-special–style problem books. Just when it seems that the Heffleys really will move, a new sequence of chaotic trouble and property destruction heralds a return to the status quo. Whew.
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs. (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-12)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3903-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own...
The sturdy Little Blue Truck is back for his third adventure, this time delivering Christmas trees to his band of animal pals.
The truck is decked out for the season with a Christmas wreath that suggests a nose between headlights acting as eyeballs. Little Blue loads up with trees at Toad’s Trees, where five trees are marked with numbered tags. These five trees are counted and arithmetically manipulated in various ways throughout the rhyming story as they are dropped off one by one to Little Blue’s friends. The final tree is reserved for the truck’s own use at his garage home, where he is welcomed back by the tree salestoad in a neatly circular fashion. The last tree is already decorated, and Little Blue gets a surprise along with readers, as tiny lights embedded in the illustrations sparkle for a few seconds when the last page is turned. Though it’s a gimmick, it’s a pleasant surprise, and it fits with the retro atmosphere of the snowy country scenes. The short, rhyming text is accented with colored highlights, red for the animal sounds and bright green for the numerical words in the Christmas-tree countdown.
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own tree that will put a twinkle in a toddler’s eyes. (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-544-32041-3
Page Count: 24
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2014
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