A burned-out rocket booster puts a kink in pudgy, green Q Pootle 5’s plans to make it to his friend Z Pootle 6’s birthday party on the Moon. That booster looks remarkably like a tin can in Butterworth’s simply drawn cartoons—and indeed, after a forced landing on Earth, Q Pootle 5 finds that a more or less empty can of cat food makes the perfect replacement part. Once Henry the cat has finished his supper, of course, he makes certain it is empty and it does the trick. No, not exactly rocket science, but the pictures are well stocked with page-filling disaster noises—including a four-page, giant-sized “sssscccrrreeeeeeeee . . .” that is Q Pootle’s landing—and helpful earthlings, mostly of the four-legged variety. An unfolding, poster-sized party scene brings up the rear of this droll close encounter of the silly kind. (Picture book. 5-7)
Pub Date: July 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-84243-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2001
Original art and visually engrossing worlds will have readers visiting this book over and over again
A duo’s blasé afternoon deviates into an unexpected journey crossing dimension and time.
Jane, a red-haired, adventure-seeking girl, and her cautious friend Pablo, an anxious boy with oval-rimmed glasses, have exhausted their array of entertainment options: they’ve played board games, flicked through comic books, dismembered toys. Their boredom produces a trek to the old house on the hill, where they meet Dr. Jules, a talking rat and the architect of a hot air–powered time contraption. A cunning cat, Felinibus, steals pieces from the contraption and tricks the trio into the Monster Dimension. Sabotaged and with a dinner curfew looming, they set out to find the missing pieces. Domingo successfully shifts from comic panels to labyrinthine double-page spreads, from a fast-paced adventure to a focused quest. In pursuit of Felinibus and the stolen pieces, Jane, Pablo, and Dr. Jules dodge danger time and time again as they drift over Lopsided London through Macabre Marrakech, Bone-Chilling Bayou, and other such locales to Immortal India. Filled with alliteration and challenging vocabulary, the story blends adventure, a familiar Where’s Waldo concept, myth, and expedition for a new, clever search-and-find.
Original art and visually engrossing worlds will have readers visiting this book over and over again . (Graphic adventure. 5-7)Pub Date: Oct. 20, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-909263-36-9
Page Count: 57
Publisher: Flying Eye Books
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2015
Although the author may be famous in the adult literary world, this story is not a success.
A well-known New Zealand writer for adults offers children a tale about an inanimate object who wants to live like a person.
A mountain walks to town, where it meets Thomas, a white boy who stays behind when all the other people flee, and says: “I only want to live in a house.” Thomas decides that the mountain is too large for any house. There is a folkloric element to the tale, as Thomas tries in three ways to help the mountain get his wish. First he attempts to shrink the mountain with soap and water and then chips away at the stone. Finally, he decides that his father, an artist, will paint the mountain’s picture and put it in a house. He persuades the mountain that it can remain a place where people can enjoy picnicking and skiing and still live in a house with people, a Solomonic solution that may not resonate with the intended audience. The acrylic paintings, mostly in shades of brown and gray, are realistically rendered, except when the mountain comes to life with the craggy, anthropomorphized face of a sculpted idol. There is a surrealist, static feel to some of the paintings, and the language, no doubt aspiring as well to the folkloric, is stilted.
Although the author may be famous in the adult literary world, this story is not a success. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: April 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-76036-002-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Starfish Bay
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2016
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