Color and composition combine to beautifully express friendship and the wonders of the world.
“It’s hard for a small, ugly skeleton to make friends.”
Skeleton Oscar is sad when he loses a tooth—he looks “so dreadful” without it—but at least he has his skeleton dog, Tag, to play with. One day, he sees a little girl burying a tooth; she seems to be a possible friend. When she sees Oscar’s missing tooth, she laughs out loud and offers him the tooth she is about to bury. A moment later, she takes him by the hand, and their adventure begins. The minimal text lets the collaged pictures tell the story. Oscar and the girl look at a rainbow and smell the scent of wet grass and visit her house, where they meet her ma. They also frolic at the seaside and share their biggest secrets. Oscar takes her by the hand to return the favor. He takes her to his favorite places: the park and the library and up a tree to look for sleeping butterflies. Readers will note that the backgrounds of her world are vivid and bright while his are black with hints of brown and warm reds. Both are richly textured and fanciful, the gutter serving as permeable demarcation between worlds. At day’s end, Oscar gives her back the tooth; what he’s found is much more valuable.
Color and composition combine to beautifully express friendship and the wonders of the world. (Picture book. 3-12)Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-911373-79-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Lantana
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
Safe to creep on by.
Carle’s famous caterpillar expresses its love.
In three sentences that stretch out over most of the book’s 32 pages, the (here, at least) not-so-ravenous larva first describes the object of its love, then describes how that loved one makes it feel before concluding, “That’s why… / I[heart]U.” There is little original in either visual or textual content, much of it mined from The Very Hungry Caterpillar. “You are… / …so sweet,” proclaims the caterpillar as it crawls through the hole it’s munched in a strawberry; “…the cherry on my cake,” it says as it perches on the familiar square of chocolate cake; “…the apple of my eye,” it announces as it emerges from an apple. Images familiar from other works join the smiling sun that shone down on the caterpillar as it delivers assurances that “you make… / …the sun shine brighter / …the stars sparkle,” and so on. The book is small, only 7 inches high and 5 ¾ inches across when closed—probably not coincidentally about the size of a greeting card. While generations of children have grown up with the ravenous caterpillar, this collection of Carle imagery and platitudinous sentiment has little of his classic’s charm. The melding of Carle’s caterpillar with Robert Indiana’s iconic LOVE on the book’s cover, alas, draws further attention to its derivative nature.
Safe to creep on by. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Dec. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-448-48932-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists.
How to raise money for a coveted poster: put your friends to work!
John, founder of the FUBU fashion line and a Shark Tank venture capitalist, offers a self-referential blueprint for financial success. Having only half of the $10 he needs for a Minka J poster, Daymond forks over $1 to buy a plain T-shirt, paints a picture of the pop star on it, sells it for $5, and uses all of his cash to buy nine more shirts. Then he recruits three friends to decorate them with his design and help sell them for an unspecified amount (from a conveniently free and empty street-fair booth) until they’re gone. The enterprising entrepreneur reimburses himself for the shirts and splits the remaining proceeds, which leaves him with enough for that poster as well as a “brand-new business book,” while his friends express other fiscal strategies: saving their share, spending it all on new art supplies, or donating part and buying a (math) book with the rest. (In a closing summation, the author also suggests investing in stocks, bonds, or cryptocurrency.) Though Miles cranks up the visual energy in her sparsely detailed illustrations by incorporating bright colors and lots of greenbacks, the actual advice feels a bit vague. Daymond is Black; most of the cast are people of color. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists. (Picture book. 7-9)Pub Date: March 21, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-56727-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
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