Classmates of various ethnicities receive gifts from their relatives in other countries. “What was sent to the brown-eyed boy / From his abuela in Mexico? / From Tapalpa came a sombrero of straw. / Oh he never saw / such a sombrero of straw / From rural Mexico.” Each spread has a new verse, picturing the relative in a framed landscape on the left, and a spot illustration of the child wearing the gift on white background on the right. Weiss has lifted the verse structure and pattern whole from a Bertolt Brecht lyric to a Kurt Weill song, “Und was bekam des Soldaten Weib?,” which is unattributed here. Though children will not likely know this, adults may balk (especially as Weill’s haunting but dirge-like music doesn’t suit Weiss’s cheerful theme—there is no music in this book). Her verses are sometimes lilting, but sometimes awkward, breaking the rhythm entirely. She depicts her characters simply and effectively in richly vibrant color-pencil illustrations. The final page includes a map and a glossary of foreign terms. Despite its slightness and occasional clumsiness, this has obvious tie-ins for teachers building units on ancestry or geography, and would be suitable for classroom use. (Picture book. 4-7)
Pub Date: Oct. 31, 2000
ISBN: 0-688-17213-X
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2000
Pedestrian.
Mr. Brown can’t help with farm chores because his shoes are missing—a common occurrence in his household and likely in many readers’ as well.
Children will be delighted that the titular Mr. Brown is in fact a child. After Mr. Brown looks in his closet and sorts through his other family members’ shoes with no luck, his father and his siblings help him search the farm. Eventually—after colorful pages that enable readers to spot footwear hiding—the family gives up on their hunt, and Mr. Brown asks to be carried around for the chores. He rides on his father’s shoulders as Papa gets his work done, as seen on a double-page spread of vignettes. The resolution is more of a lesson for the adult readers than for children, a saccharine moment where father and son express their joy that the missing shoes gave them the opportunity for togetherness—with advice for other parents to appreciate those fleeting moments themselves. Though the art is bright and cheerful, taking advantage of the setting, it occasionally is misaligned with the text (for example, the text states that Mr. Brown is wearing his favorite green shirt while the illustration is of a shirt with wide stripes of white and teal blue, which could confuse readers at the point where they’re trying to figure out which family member is Mr. Brown). The family is light-skinned. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Pedestrian. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 14, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-5460-0389-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: WorthyKids/Ideals
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2022
Teachers looking for a new way to start off the school year will eat this one up.
In Murray’s children’s debut, when a gingerbread man made by schoolchildren gets left behind at recess, he decides he has to find his class: “I’ll run and I’ll run, / As fast as I can. / I can catch them! I’m their / Gingerbread Man!”
And so begins his rollicking rhyming adventure as he runs, limps, slides and skips his way through the school, guided on his way by the friendly teachers he meets. Flattened by a volleyball near the gym, he gets his broken toe fixed by the kindly nurse and then slides down the railing into the art teacher’s lunch. Then it’s off to the principal’s office, where he takes a spin in her chair before she arrives. “The children you mentioned just left you to cool. / They’re hanging these posters of you through the school.” The principal takes him back to the classroom, where the children all welcome him back. The book’s comic-book layout suits the elementary-school tour that this is, while Lowery’s cartoon artwork fits the folktale theme. Created with pencil, screen printing and digital color, the simple illustrations give preschoolers a taste of what school will be like. While the Gingerbread Man is wonderfully expressive, though, the rather cookie-cutter teachers could use a little more life.
Teachers looking for a new way to start off the school year will eat this one up. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: July 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-399-25052-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2011
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