The illustrator of Karen Hesse’s Come On, Rain! (1999) places Charlip’s (Peanut Butter Party, not reviewed, etc.) rushed young narrator amidst an extended, multicultural family and gives her a book that is recognizably this one, sometimes even open to the same spread. As a clock ticks away in the background, she details her morning routine from first big stretch to schoolward rush, then reels off afternoon and evening tasks that somehow manage to fill every moment until bedtime. (There’s a clock to watch on every page, and multiple clocks on those with many panels.) Often, she’s got the book with her; as often, she leaves it behind. Somehow, she never gets to read it, even though it’s open wide and she’s not even going to an after-school activity. Figures are posed with casual, natural-looking grace; the legibly hand-lettered text alternates between the narrator’s breathless chatter and family members’ antiphonal comments (“WHO LEFT THIS BOOK IN THE FRIDGE?”) slanting across opposite pages. Children might want to share this veteran writer’s oblique, whimsical reminder to slow down and smell the printer’s ink with their overscheduled parents. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2000
ISBN: 1-58246-018-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Tricycle
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2000
Having met the Sandman himself in Ship of Dreams (1994), Joey falls in with a larger cast of elementals, including Father Time and Mother Nature. Now living in an inventor's long-vacant house, Joey constructs a time machine from notes and gadgets left in the attic, and hurtles off across the Sea of Time to the islands where the keepers of the sun, moon, stars, and weather live—jamming the great clock that measures out Perpetual Absolute Standard Time (P.A.S.T.) in the process. Getting it started again, and getting home, requires a short, easy quest. Morrissey's large accompanying paintings are models of magic photo-realism; he assembles into fantastical machines a variety of antique keys, charms, brasswork, and dented, peeling old toys, and places them into settings in which every leaf and nail is precisely limned. Readers are likely to ignore the unexceptional plot and characters to pore over the pictures, which are executed with dazzling virtuosity. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1997
ISBN: 0-8109-3396-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1997
Another bright-eyed dose of Spanish vocabulary from Elya (Say Hola to Spanish, 1996). Jaunty, rhyming couplets introduce the words, and Lopez has provided illustrations in saturated, paintbox colors. Following the format of the first book, Elya makes an effort to give the platform for the 70+ words some continuity, but some strange bedfellows on the page undercut the lesson's effectiveness: ``Musicians are m£sicos. Flags are banderas. Please don't run when using tijeras.'' Some of the comments are obscure—``Too much [ice cream] makes you gordo instead of delgado''—and sometimes it is difficult to match the words to the images, but this is still a lot more fun than listening to language tapes. And if the words have verve, the art fairly dances off the page. (glossary) (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1997
ISBN: 1-880000-59-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Lee & Low Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1997
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