Seasonal changes—and outfit changes, too.
As children fling open their doors to run outside, the titular question comes to mind: “Do I have to wear a coat?” Laid out in a similar style to those in Isadora’s previous musing on the senses, I Hear a Pickle (and Smell, See, Touch, and Taste It, Too!) (2016), various vignettes of diverse tots explore spring, summer, fall, and winter. Each season is opened with a picture of the same pigtailed white youngster and a dog looking at a tree. As the seasons change, readers see differences to the leaves and changes to the child’s clothing. Spring brings flowers, baseball games, sidewalk chalk, and raincoats. Summer brings ice cream, fireflies, sand castles, and no coats at all! In the fall, sweaters are warm and cozy accompaniments for hayrides, jumping into leaf piles, and apple picking. Winter, the coat-iest season, brings snow angels, frosty air, steamy hot chocolate, and of course, bundles and bundles of coats! Isadora explores the seasons not only through outerwear, but also activities that are intimate and familiar to those who experience these seasons. Vignettes include racially diverse children; two kids in sports wheelchairs play tennis, and an amputee on crutches plays soccer. Children will feel each season deeply, with or without their coats!
A fresh perspective on a cyclical topic. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: March 3, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-525-51660-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: Dec. 8, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2020
Categories: CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S HEALTH & DAILY LIVING
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A succession of animal dads do their best to teach their young to say “Dada” in this picture-book vehicle for Fallon.
A grumpy bull says, “DADA!”; his calf moos back. A sad-looking ram insists, “DADA!”; his lamb baas back. A duck, a bee, a dog, a rabbit, a cat, a mouse, a donkey, a pig, a frog, a rooster, and a horse all fail similarly, spread by spread. A final two-spread sequence finds all of the animals arrayed across the pages, dads on the verso and children on the recto. All the text prior to this point has been either iterations of “Dada” or animal sounds in dialogue bubbles; here, narrative text states, “Now everybody get in line, let’s say it together one more time….” Upon the turn of the page, the animal dads gaze round-eyed as their young across the gutter all cry, “DADA!” (except the duckling, who says, “quack”). Ordóñez's illustrations have a bland, digital look, compositions hardly varying with the characters, although the pastel-colored backgrounds change. The punch line fails from a design standpoint, as the sudden, single-bubble chorus of “DADA” appears to be emanating from background features rather than the baby animals’ mouths (only some of which, on close inspection, appear to be open). It also fails to be funny.
Plotless and pointless, the book clearly exists only because its celebrity author wrote it. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: June 9, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-250-00934-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2015
Categories: CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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SEEN & HEARD
Friends don’t let friends expire in snowdrifts.
Convoluted storytelling and confusing art turn a cute premise into a mishmash of a book. Scooper’s a front loader that works in the town salt yard, replenishing the snowplows that arrive. Dumper’s her best friend, more than happy to plow and salt the roads himself. When the big city calls in Dumper to help with a snow squall, he brushes off Scooper’s concerns. Yet slippery roads and a seven-vehicle pileup launch poor Dumper onto his side in a snowbank. Can Scooper overcome fears that she’s too slow and save the day? Following a plot as succinct as this should be a breeze, but the rhyming text obfuscates more than it clarifies. Lines such as, “Dumper’s here— / let’s rock ’n’ roll! / Big city’s callin’ for / some small-town soul” can prove impenetrable. The art of the book matches this confusion, with light-blue Dumper often hard to pick out among other, similarly colored vehicles, particularly in the snowstorm. Speech bubbles, as when the city calls for Scooper’s and Dumper’s help, lead to a great deal of visual confusion. Scooper is also featured sporting long eyelashes and a bow, lest anyone mistake the dithering, frightened truck as anything but female. (This book was reviewed digitally with 11-by-17-inch double-page spreads viewed at 16.8% of actual size.)
Who ya gonna call? A different snowplow book. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5420-9268-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Two Lions
Review Posted Online: Sept. 15, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2020
Categories: CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S TRANSPORTATION
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