by Nick Bruel & illustrated by Nick Bruel ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2005
She may be a “bad bad BAD Kitty,” but she’s the star of an alphabet book that should be in every collection. This poor, black kitty only became bad when her family ran out of kitty-appropriate food. She was going to be forced to eat an alphabet of healthy foods, asparagus to zucchini. So she perpetrates an alphabet of badness, from “Ate my homework” to “Zeroing the zinnias.” Then her loving family returns from the grocery with an alphabet of great kitty food, anchovies to zebra ziti—some of it silly, but she’s excited enough to reform and perform an alphabet of gracious actions, from apologizing to a nipped grandma to lulling a baby into a “zzz”-ful sleep. Kitty gets a present too, her just deserts (a puppy to play with). Bruel’s little black star is perhaps the hammiest, most expressive feline ever captured in watercolors. The quarter-page illustrations for all the letters in all four alphabets are littered with little (and big) laughs. Even the alphabet-experienced will love this bad, bad kitty! (Picture book. 3-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2005
ISBN: 1-59643-069-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2005
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by Nick Bruel ; illustrated by Nick Bruel
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by Nick Bruel ; illustrated by Nick Bruel
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by Nick Bruel ; illustrated by Nick Bruel
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BOOK TO SCREEN
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
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by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Sarah Jennings
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by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Dan Yaccarino
by Karma Wilson ; illustrated by Jane Chapman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 16, 2024
Cheery fun that will leave series fans “egg”-static.
In his latest outing, Bear and his pals go in search of eggs.
Bear “lumbers with his friends through the Strawberry Vale.” Raven finds a nest; climbing up, “The bear finds eggs!”: a refrain that appears throughout. Instead of eating the robin’s eggs, however, Bear leaves a gift of dried berries in the nest for the “soon-to-be-chicks.” Next, the friends find 10 mallard eggs (as bright blue as the robin’s), and Bear leaves sunflower seeds. Then the wail of Mama Meadowlark, whose bright yellow undercarriage strikes a warm golden note, leads them to promise to find her lost eggs. With his friends’ assistance, Bear finds one, and they decide to paint them “so they aren’t lost again.” Another is discovered, painted, and placed in Hare’s basket. After hours of persistent searching, Bear suddenly spots the remaining two eggs “in a small patch of clover.” Before they can return these eggs, the chicks hatch and rejoin their mother. Back at his lair, Bear, with his troupe, is visited by all 17 chicks and the robin, mallard, and meadowlark moms: “And the bear finds friends!” Though this sweet spring tale centers on finding and painting eggs, it makes no overt references to Easter. The soft green and blue acrylics, predictable rhymes, and rolling rhythm make this series installment another low-key natural read-aloud.
Cheery fun that will leave series fans “egg”-static. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2024
ISBN: 9781665936552
Page Count: 40
Publisher: McElderry
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2024
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by Karma Wilson ; illustrated by AG Ford
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by Karma Wilson ; illustrated by Jane Chapman
BOOK REVIEW
by Karma Wilson ; illustrated by Jane Chapman
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