A welcome Chinese addition to the fairy-tale shelf.
Goldy Luck, not an especially lucky child, is awoken by her mother one Chinese New Year and sent to the neighbors’ to wish them “Kung Hei Fat Choi” and deliver a plate of turnip cakes.
Tired and hungry, and thinking of the neighbor boy who doesn’t share, she is reluctant, but she takes her mother’s advice seriously: To avoid bad luck in the new year, she must resolve arguments and be kind. Though no one is home at the Chans’, she enters—and drops the cakes. In trying to clean up, she follows the typical “Goldilocks” storyline, eating the Chans’ congee, breaking a chair, falling asleep in a bed. When the Chans (anthropomorphized pandas) return home, the embarrassed Goldy runs away, but her conscience gets the better of her. In a moral addendum, Goldy returns to the Chans’ to put things right, forming a friendship with Little Chan in the process. Zong’s acrylic illustrations bring Goldy’s culture to life through small details in the households as well as the Chinese New Year parade glimpsed through the doors and windows, though some of the details (Mr. Chan’s massage chair) may seem stereotypical. An author’s note explains more about Chinese New Year and is followed by a chart, unfortunately yearless, of the Chinese zodiac and concludes with a recipe for turnip cakes.
A welcome Chinese addition to the fairy-tale shelf. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-58089-652-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: Nov. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Too cute to be spooky indeed but most certainly sweet.
A ghost longs to be scary, but none of the creepy personas she tries on fit.
Misty, a feline ghost with big green eyes and long whiskers, wants to be the frightening presence that her haunted house calls for, but sadly, she’s “too cute to be spooky.” She dons toilet paper to resemble a mummy, attempts to fly on a broom like a witch, and howls at the moon like a werewolf. Nothing works. She heads to a Halloween party dressed reluctantly as herself. When she arrives, her friends’ joyful screams reassure her that she’s great just as she is. Sadler’s message, though a familiar one, is delivered effectively in a charming, ghostly package. Misty truly is too precious to be frightening. Laberis depicts an endearingly spooky, all-animal cast—a frog witch, for instance, and a crocodilian mummy. Misty’s sidekick, a cheery little bat who lends support throughout, might be even more adorable than she is. Though Misty’s haunted house is filled with cobwebs and surrounded by jagged, leafless trees, the charming characters keep things from ever getting too frightening. The images will encourage lingering looks. Clearly, there’s plenty that makes Misty special just as she is—a takeaway that adults sharing the book with their little ones should be sure to drive home.
Too cute to be spooky indeed but most certainly sweet. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2024
ISBN: 9780593702901
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
All-in-good-fun Halloween scares.
In NSYNC singer Bass’ debut picture book, trick-or-treaters follow their fearless leader down Scary Street in search of sweets, or so they think.
On Halloween night, a mischievous child dressed as a wolf, reminiscent of Max from Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are (1963), leads a large, racially diverse group of costumed children down Scary Street. The youngster, who narrates, proceeds to bring them to a series of creepy fun house–style homes, including a mansion belonging to a menacingly dapper vampire, who offers “toothy snacks” to the terrified-looking trick-or-treaters, and a gingerbread cottage inhabited by a Cruella de Vil–esque witch, who might prefer to bake little children into her house rather than give them treats. Uh-oh. Now there are only four children following the increasingly unreliable narrator, who ominously repeats, “No tricks allowed, just tasty treats.” As it turns out, the narrator does have a trick in store, which completes the scare and brings the story to a happy conclusion. Bass uses a simple, sometimes uneven rhyme pattern that ranges from interesting combinations (missed is rhymed with resist) to more familiar ones (treats/sweets) with a dash of tongue-in-cheek humor. Garrigue’s atmospheric illustrations have a Coney Island sideshow vibe, created with a candy palette that’s both invitingly tasty and garish in just the right way. The narrator, the vampire, and the witch are light-skinned.
All-in-good-fun Halloween scares. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: July 23, 2024
ISBN: 9781454952176
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Union Square Kids
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2024
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