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THE GIRL WHO WORE TWO DIFFERENT SHOES

Name: THE GIRL WHO WORE TWO DIFFERENT SHOES
Author: Rayna Rose Exelbierd

by Rayna Rose Exelbierd ; illustrated by Allyn Chapman Fraser ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

A brightly colored celebration of individuality that unfortunately falls flat.

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A quirky woman spreads joy and optimism wherever she goes in Exelbierd’s illustrated children’s book.

Rayna Rose, known to those around her for always wearing two different colored shoes, spends her days celebrating the differences that make her—and everyone else—unique. Always looking on the bright side, Rayna Rose doesn’t let things like traffic get her down. Instead, she gets out of her car and dances while waiting for a bridge to come down, or starts impromptu games with other cars at red lights: “Do you know how to play rock, paper, scissors shoe? / That’s Rayna Rose’s favorite thing to do! Games, Sports, / and even high fives mean the same in every language.” Readers follow Rayna Rose as she runs errands, rollerblades by the ocean, and gets her nails done. Through it all, she maintains a healthy sense of confidence and encourages others to do the same. Fraser’s illustrations are outlined in bold black lines with bright colors and minimal shading. The style is highly cartoonish (people only have four fingers on each hand, for example) and exudes the same joy that Rayna Rose clearly radiates. While the book relays the important theme of embracing what makes us different, there are plenty of typos and random capitalizations to distract from that message. The story is told in verse, and the rhyme scheme is haphazard at best, with some lines not making much sense at all. The narrator mentions Tennessee for no other reason than to make a rhyme, for example, when it’s been established that Rayna Rose lives near the ocean: “She needs to get her nails done for her speech. / She goes to see her friend Tony, he is Vietnamese. / She says, ‘Tony, let’s make my nails pretty for Tennessee!’” All of this ultimately results in a book with an uplifting moral that is conveyed in a disappointingly muddled way.

A brightly colored celebration of individuality that unfortunately falls flat.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: N/A

Review Posted Online: Nov. 13, 2024

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)

Pub Date: June 21, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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A PERFECT PLACE TO PLAY
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Jim Valeri

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF FIRST GRADE
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Sarah Jennings

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FIVE LITTLE BUNNIES
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Dan Yaccarino

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THE CRAYONS GO BACK TO SCHOOL

by Drew Daywalt ; illustrated by Oliver Jeffers ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 16, 2023

Nothing new here but a nonetheless congenial matriculant in publishing’s autumnal rite of back-to-school offerings.

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The Crayons head back to class in this latest series entry.

Daywalt’s expository text lays out the basics as various Crayons wave goodbye to the beach, choose a first-day outfit, greet old friends, and make new ones. As in previous outings, the perennially droll illustrations and hand-lettered Crayon-speak drive the humor. The ever wrapperless Peach, opining, “What am I going to wear?” surveys three options: top hat and tails, a chef’s toque and apron, and a Santa suit. New friends Chunky Toddler Crayon (who’s missing a bite-sized bit of their blue point) and Husky Toddler Crayon speculate excitedly on their common last name: “I wonder if we’re related!” White Crayon, all but disappearing against the page’s copious white space, sits cross-legged reading a copy of H.G. Wells’ The Invisible Man. And Yellow and Orange, notable for their previous existential argument about the color of the sun, find agreement in science class: Jupiter, clearly, is yellow AND orange. Everybody’s excited about art class—“Even if they make a mess. Actually…ESPECIALLY if they make a mess!” Here, a spread of crayoned doodles of butterflies, hearts, and stars is followed by one with fulsome scribbles. Fans of previous outings will spot cameos from Glow in the Dark and yellow-caped Esteban (the Crayon formerly known as Pea Green). (This book was reviewed digitally.)

Nothing new here but a nonetheless congenial matriculant in publishing’s autumnal rite of back-to-school offerings. (Picture book. 4-6)