Perfectly paced and bursting with laughs, the tale will appeal to fans of humor and reluctant readers alike, who will...
Chewing gum imbues a girl with gooey superpowers in this laugh-out-loud early chapter book.
Gabby Gomez loves chewing gum, anyplace, anytime—even in her sleep. So when she wakes up with gum stuck in her hair, her mother decides she’s had enough and outlaws the sticky substance. Poor Gabby doesn’t mean to disobey her mother, but when she discovers a piece of MIGHTY-MEGA ULTRA-STRETCHY SUPER-DUPER EXTENDA-BUBBLE BUBBLE GUM, she can’t resist. The special gum results in the biggest bubble ever, and when it pops, the outcome is not just a gum-covered girl, but one with sudden, gummy superpowers. Gabby’s new powers enable her to help people in need, but the price of hiding them from her mom is hard to bear. Using a successful blend of traditional prose, dialogue bubbles and bold-lined, black-and-white illustrations, Montijo delivers laughs all the way through, ensuring that the “moral” never hampers the fun. The one place Montijo stumbles is in the disappointing portrayal of class bully Natalie Gooch, a stereotypically large, boyish-looking girl; there are plenty of small “girly-girls” who are horrible bullies—let’s see more of those.
Perfectly paced and bursting with laughs, the tale will appeal to fans of humor and reluctant readers alike, who will identify with Gabby’s sticky situation. (Fiction/graphic hybrid. 6-9)Pub Date: Aug. 20, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4231-5740-3
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: April 2, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2013
At least he was let out of his room.
In an obvious and clumsy remake of Where the Wild Things Are, a rude young “pirate” is consigned to his room until he learns better manners.
Dressed in a store-bought pirate outfit and waving a toy cutlass, Billy’s obnoxious “Back away from me bounty, poppet” to his mother—visible in Tans’ bland, literal paintings only from the neck down—results in lunchtime banishment to his bedroom. It is soon transformed into a succession of ships and nautical settings. The author’s attempt to sidestep potential controversy by having Billy sing out “Yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of scum!” really only calls attention to the original’s reference to alcohol, and his stuffed parrot’s cries of “Booty! Booty!” will definitely induce giggles in modern audiences, for whom the word has a meaning that is likely not what was intended. Waking up hungry to the scent of “a dinner fit for a prince,” Billy finally makes a quick change to another (also plainly store-bought) costume for a grand re-entrance: “Dear Queen, your prince has arrived with hands washed. Many thanks for the banquet.”
At least he was let out of his room. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-58980-982-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Pelican
Review Posted Online: Sept. 25, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The poetics of restraint could not be better displayed
Timing is everything.
Imagine this classic slapstick scene: Two repairmen have to carry a pane of glass across a busy street. Car after car whizzes past and, somehow, swerves around them. The whole scene is about waiting for the glass to break. Egan’s latest Dodsworth book is a lot like that. “We should be on our best behavior here,” Dodsworth tells his duck. He warns the duck not to play ball around priceless vases. He warns the duck not to play with a bottle of ink. “The duck,” the text notes, had always wanted to play with ink.” The duck does not crash into the pottery. The duck doesn’t spill any ink, and a server in a restaurant tells Dodsworth, “Arigato. Your duck is very well behaved.” As in classic slapstick, though, something has to give. At the climax of the story, the duck swings on a rope, springs off an awning and knocks over a tub of goldfish. It’s worth the wait. When the duck bounces across a row of drums, precisely in time to the music, it’s a very satisfying moment. But the scene really works because of what happens next: The duck walks quietly across the courtyard and hands a toy to a little girl. She had thought it was lost forever. That, too, is worth the wait.
The poetics of restraint could not be better displayed . (Early reader. 6-9)Pub Date: April 16, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-547-87745-7
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: Feb. 26, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2013
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