The Cinderella-like orphan is grudgingly taken in by her mean aunt and uncle, but she is denied adequate food and forced to...
With elements reminiscent of many different stories, this original tale features a beloved young girl named Chandra (moon in Hindi) who loses her parents in a terrible flood during monsoon season.
The Cinderella-like orphan is grudgingly taken in by her mean aunt and uncle, but she is denied adequate food and forced to work hard. Her only pleasure is playing her mother’s flute, put into her hands as her parents saved her from the raging river, but her cruel relatives take the little instrument. Chandra, who never loses hope, hears the flute and begins to find a daily meal of rice, lentils and eggplant. As everyone else starves during the drought-ridden season, she is accused of using “unholy magic,” and her uncle purposely pushes her into the next monsoon’s floodwaters. Miraculously, the flute sounds again, and the girl follows its sound until a rope pulls her to safety and into the hearts of a new set of loving parents. The dramatic illustrations create a strong, rural south Indian setting, with their quick black lines, almost-solid black bodies and bold use of red and blue, with just a hint of yellow for the moon. A traditional tale’s comeuppance for (and possible forgiveness of) the evil relatives is missing here, though, resulting in a narrative that feels incomplete.Pub Date: Feb. 15, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-896580-57-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tradewind Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 8, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The king can’t beat them, so he joins them, clueless until the end, and kids will giggle all the way. (Picture book. 6-8)
Barnett delivers a sweet slap to vanity.
This king is neither toady nor tyrant, but he just can’t get enough of himself. He gazes into the mirror that one of his retainers totes by his side, smitten and remiss. For as he takes in the royal visage, the royal roads are crumbling and the royal playground has broken swings—his kingdom is a wreck of neglect. “Enough!” cry his subjects, but all the king offers is a giant billboard of his face. That night, a giant mustache is painted on the royal puss. Outraged, the king wants the culprit flung in jail. The wanted posters, of course, feature the king’s face. More mustaches materialize. “So he slouched in the Royal Throne. ‘Look at my wonderful face,’ he said. ‘Who could be doing this to me?’ ” Well, everyone. Cornell ushers the story forward with cinematic artwork, framed in elaborate medieval-like borders but paced sequentially like a comic book. As the town inadvertently re-creates itself—everybody admits their guilt, everybody must go to jail, which means a big expansion project for the prison, which results in a whole new village—there comes a bloodless revolution.
The king can’t beat them, so he joins them, clueless until the end, and kids will giggle all the way. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4231-1671-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Share with your kid, or lay it on a new grad or parental unit for some literary feel-good action.
An earnest invitation to dream big, dude, and then bigger yet.
Self-published in 2009 and gone viral in both print and free online versions, Clayton’s inspirational litany decries “un-fantastical and practical” dreams in favor of those “that no one thought to wonder / dreams so big that they’ve got dreams and they’ve got dreams up under!” His hand lettered, all-uppercase lines caption equally emphatic full-bleed cartoon scenes that contrast views of slump-shouldered, Roz Chast–style underachievers with dizzying retro sprays of surreal exuberance. The art sometimes undermines the message—dreams that “scream,” “sing” and “shout,” for instance, are all represented by similarly bellowing monsters, while the supposedly drab dream of “buying a new hat” is expressed visually with a wild, full-page blizzard of different kinds of headgear. Moreover, the metrics are clumsy at best (“…remember what I said / ‘Close your eyes my child / and dream / that perfect dream / inside your head’ ”), and those reading it aloud will have a very difficult time navigating the almost punctuation-free text. Nevertheless, it’s a worthy effort to prod children (and adults, for that matter) out of mental ruts. Or at least crank their aspirations up a notch.
Share with your kid, or lay it on a new grad or parental unit for some literary feel-good action. (Picture book. 6-8, adult)Pub Date: April 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-06-211468-6
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Jan. 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2012
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