A bright, lighthearted, and comforting book for children missing a faraway parent.
In this illustrated children’s book, a little girl going to sleep waits for her father’s kisses and hugs to arrive from far away.
As in many families, little Gabby Ann’s father works very far away much of the time, but she knows that every night he will send her hugs and kisses. Friendly looking letters sing, “We’re Xs and Os, sent for the night. / We’re kisses and hugs, to help Gabby sleep tight.” Of course, her mother kisses her goodnight, too, but Gabby misses her daddy. One night, she has trouble sleeping, wondering when her father’s hugs and kisses will arrive. Her mother tells her that “The sooner you sleep, the faster they’ll get here.” As Gabby tries to sleep, her father’s X’s and O’s go on a long journey: dancing on the wind, meeting kind animals all over the world, and getting rides from some, including a monkey, giraffe, dolphin, and pelican. When Gabby pops up from bed to ask her mother why daddy’s kisses and hugs are taking so long, she’s reminded to have patience. Sure enough, the X’s and O’s eventually catch a ride with the family dog, who delivers them to Gabby, and she sleeps tight, secure in her father’s love. In her debut book, Özbay tells a sweet and simple story that makes good use of repetition to engage youngsters. The animals in their varied habitats are reassuringly ready to help, and Motz’s colorful, animated illustrations of happy-looking creatures also provide appeal. It’s a bit puzzling, though, that the hugs and kisses are presented as something to help Gabby sleep but will only ever arrive after she’s already fallen asleep—a parental trick that children may or may not see through. Another minor quibble: emus are included with African animals; they’re from Australia.
A bright, lighthearted, and comforting book for children missing a faraway parent.Pub Date: May 5, 2015
ISBN: 978-0990844709
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Mascot Books
Review Posted Online: May 11, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
The greeting-card art and jokey rhymes work for the baby-shower market but not for the youngest readers.
Animal parents declare their love for their offspring through rhymed puns and sentimental art.
The title sets the scene for what’s to come: The owl asks the owlet as they fly together, “WHOO loves you?”; the kangaroo and joey make each other “very HOPPY”; and the lioness and cub are a “PURRRFECT pair.” Most of the puns are both unimaginative and groanworthy, and they are likely to go over the heads of toddlers, who are not know for their wordplay abilities. The text is set in abcb quatrains split over two double-page spreads. On each spread, one couplet appears on the verso within a lightly decorated border on pastel pages. On the recto, a full-bleed portrait of the animal and baby appears in softly colored and cozy images. Hearts are prominent on every page, floating between the parent and baby as if it is necessary to show the love between each pair. Although these critters are depicted in mistily conceived natural habitats and are unclothed, they are human stand-ins through and through.
The greeting-card art and jokey rhymes work for the baby-shower market but not for the youngest readers. (Board book. 6 mos-2)Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-7282-1374-3
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Good Guys and Bad get just deserts in the end, and Stanley gets plenty of opportunities to display pluck and valor in this...
Sentenced to a brutal juvenile detention camp for a crime he didn't commit, a wimpy teenager turns four generations of bad family luck around in this sunburnt tale of courage, obsession, and buried treasure from Sachar (Wayside School Gets a Little Stranger, 1995, etc.).
Driven mad by the murder of her black beau, a schoolteacher turns on the once-friendly, verdant town of Green Lake, Texas, becomes feared bandit Kissin' Kate Barlow, and dies, laughing, without revealing where she buried her stash. A century of rainless years later, lake and town are memories—but, with the involuntary help of gangs of juvenile offenders, the last descendant of the last residents is still digging. Enter Stanley Yelnats IV, great-grandson of one of Kissin' Kate's victims and the latest to fall to the family curse of being in the wrong place at the wrong time; under the direction of The Warden, a woman with rattlesnake venom polish on her long nails, Stanley and each of his fellow inmates dig a hole a day in the rock-hard lake bed. Weeks of punishing labor later, Stanley digs up a clue, but is canny enough to conceal the information of which hole it came from. Through flashbacks, Sachar weaves a complex net of hidden relationships and well-timed revelations as he puts his slightly larger-than-life characters under a sun so punishing that readers will be reaching for water bottles.
Good Guys and Bad get just deserts in the end, and Stanley gets plenty of opportunities to display pluck and valor in this rugged, engrossing adventure. (Fiction. 9-13)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1998
ISBN: 978-0-374-33265-5
Page Count: 233
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2000
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