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THE SCREAMING CHEF

Name: THE SCREAMING CHEF
Author: Peter Ackerman
ISBN: 978-1-56792-598-2

by Peter Ackerman ; illustrated by Max Dalton ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 27, 2017

Order something else.

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A boy with an obnoxious habit finds a vocation—and maybe a dash of maturity—in the kitchen.

Ackerman buries his message, if any, beneath a deluge of so-clever bons mots. As the white child protagonist stops screaming only when he’s fed, his harried parents ply him with so much chickpea curry and “luscialicious” linguini that he grows too fat to fit in the door. When some burned chicken sparks a fresh tantrum they throw in the dish towel and tell him to serve up his own meals—whereupon he becomes more enamored of cooking than eating, slims down, and opens a restaurant. The screams start up again after a food critic’s “scrump-diddly-icious” rave brings so much frantic business that the lad tops a sundae with a chicken leg and plops his mother on a plate of lentils. Her threat to close the cafe if he doesn’t stop the noise leads to a high-volume apology, songs rather than screams, and a fresh stream of delectable creations: “A girl tasted the molten chocolate lava cake, jumped up and recited the alphabet in Swahili. (And she didn’t even know Swahili).” Nor, it turns out, does Dalton, who represents that white girl’s outburst with a cloud of random shapes. Overall, the illustrations fail either to echo the narrative’s labored air of sophistication or even to make the food plated up for a racially diverse array of diners look appetizing.

Order something else. (Picture book. 6-8)

Pub Date: July 27, 2017

ISBN: 978-1-56792-598-2

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Godine

Review Posted Online: May 23, 2017

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2017

Categories:

CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

- BOOK REVIEW
THE LONELY TYPEWRITER
by Peter Ackerman ; illustrated by Max Dalton

- BOOK REVIEW
THE LONELY PHONE BOOTH
by Peter Ackerman & illustrated by Max Dalton

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THE GIRL WHO LOVED WILD HORSES

by Paul Goble ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 1, 1978

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There are many parallel legends – the seal women, for example, with their strange sad longings – but none is more direct than this American Indian story of a girl who is carried away in a horses’ stampede…to ride thenceforth by the side of a beautiful stallion who leads the wild horses. The girl had always loved horses, and seemed to understand them “in a special way”; a year after her disappearance her people find her riding beside the stallion, calf in tow, and take her home despite his strong resistance. But she is unhappy and returns to the stallion; after that, a beautiful mare is seen riding always beside him. Goble tells the story soberly, allowing it to settle, to find its own level. The illustrations are in the familiar striking Goble style, but softened out here and there with masses of flowers and foliage – suitable perhaps for the switch in subject matter from war to love, but we miss the spanking clean design of Custer’s Last Battle and The Fetterman Fight. 6-7

Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1978

ISBN: 0689845049

Page Count: -

Publisher: Bradbury

Review Posted Online: April 26, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1978

Categories:

CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

- BOOK REVIEW
RED CLOUD'S WAR
by Paul Goble ; illustrated by Paul Goble ; introduction by Robert Lewis

- BOOK REVIEW
ALL OUR RELATIVES
by Paul Goble & illustrated by Paul Goble

- BOOK REVIEW
SONG OF CREATION
by Paul Goble & illustrated by Paul Goble

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THOSE BUILDING MEN

by Angela Johnson & illustrated by Barry Moser ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 2001

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Vague text and anemic pictures make this at best a half-hearted tribute to the construction workers of the last century or so. In her brief, poetic text Johnson writes of “those shadowy building men . . . moving the earth to connect water,” of “railroad workers . . . who were there to connect all.” She continues: “As buildings tower above us / they tell the tales / of the cities . . . They whisper down past it all and say, / ‘They built us, your fathers . . .’ ” There is little here to engage child readers, either intellectually or emotionally, and Moser’s remote, indistinct portraits of ordinary-looking men (only men) dressed in sturdy working clothes and, mostly, at rest, only intermittently capture any sense of individual or collective effort. In evident recognition of these inadequacies, a prose afterword has been added to explain what the book is about—a superfluous feature had Moser and Johnson produced work up to their usual standards. Let readers spend time more profitably with the likes of John Henry or Mike Mulligan. (Picture book. 6-8)