Absurdist and realistic at the same time, this Israeli mermaid tale requires a dry sense of humor.
Grain-of-Sand, a mermaid, suddenly appears in Mr. Whatwilltheysay’s apartment.
Greatly concerned with his neighbors’ opinions, blank-faced Mr. Whatwilltheysay wants the mermaid to leave, but only when no one can see her. Although he is attracted to her, he cannot imagine marrying her, her bottom half consisting of a fish tail—he is true to his rather obvious name. She rightly calls him out on his fish-shaming: “You’re saying that because you have legs.” She keeps trying to introduce her watery ways into his humdrum life, but he’s not falling for her the way that males usually do in mermaid tales. When she disappears, he realizes his mistake. He madly searches the Tel Aviv waterfront and, on the fourth night, finally spots her, rising majestically from the waves, in the bathtub she stole from his apartment. The old stories do ring true, but after the fearful guy joins her, Grain-of-Sand has the last word: “I saved the tub stopper for you, my darling.” The two main characters present white. Inspired by mermaid legends, this Israeli import has a wry humor that may mystify young readers here. The surrealist illustrations feature intense colors on very shiny paper; they will draw everyone’s attention, children and adults alike.
Absurdist and realistic at the same time, this Israeli mermaid tale requires a dry sense of humor. (Picture book. 6-9)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-63206-211-6
Page Count: 36
Publisher: Restless Books
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2019
Simple text, short chapters, and plenty of illustrations will appeal to emerging readers who prefer just a little shiver...
What happens if you move to a new town and your house is haunted? Andres is about to find out!
Andres Miedoso—his last name means “fearful” in Spanish—is “definitely not the coolest and bravest kid in the world.” In fact, Andres likes normal-boring and understands normal-boring, because he is normal-boring. But when the brown-skinned, curly haired Latino child and his family move to Kersville, he finds out his new home is anything but normal-boring. Fortunately, his next-door neighbor, a black boy named Desmond Cole who is the same age as Andres, is “the coolest, bravest kid in the world.” Desmond’s business as stated on his business card is “Ghost Patrol.” How lucky should a boy feel to live in a haunted house? Very—if you’re Desmond. Not so lucky if you’re Andres. But when the ghost eats a lasagna that makes him sick and tells them he’s been moving from house to house, Andres feels sorry and invites the ghost to stay as long as he promises “not to do any spooky stuff.” A deal is struck, a friendship is born, and a new series for chapter-book readers gets off to a good start.
Simple text, short chapters, and plenty of illustrations will appeal to emerging readers who prefer just a little shiver with their story—and to other readers too. (Suspense. 6-9)Pub Date: Dec. 12, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5344-1039-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2017
The book is brilliant in its confirmation of an essential truth of childhood, but that doesn’t make it any less unsettling,...
A lad is tormented by existential boojums every night in this comically eerie variation on a common bedtime trope.
No sooner do his parents bid him sweet dreams and switch off the light than the ceiling becomes “a black hole…black and infinite”—through which float small creatures of diverse shape who stand around his bed and stare at him fixedly. At last, the arrival of a slit-eyed blot that reaches out with twiggy tentacles and whispers, “I am what there is before there is anything there,” sends him pelting toward the parental bedroom. “It’s just your imagination,” soothes his mother, oblivious to the creature that floats into view on the last page. Liniers depicts the grown-ups from neck down to create a child-level perspective, but his dot-eyed, angst-ridden protagonist could be any age. Heavily crosshatched shadows and nighttime visitors with mildly grotesque features add appropriately spooky notes. Snuggling between parents (“But this is the last time”) banishes those boogeymen, right? Wrong.
The book is brilliant in its confirmation of an essential truth of childhood, but that doesn’t make it any less unsettling, though possibly more for adult readers than for children . (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Sept. 9, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-55498-385-8
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Groundwood
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2014
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