High on style, but rather low on substance, this reads like a wannabe inspirational graduation gift.
Opening with the simple, titular text, “The world belongs to you,” on the verso and a green circle on the recto, ensuing pages hold that “you belong to the world” and describe how this mutual belonging bestows freedoms and limits. Strong graphic art is more or less successful in interpreting the text, though some of the musings—“You are free to be loved. Or not,” for example—suggest a more sophisticated audience than the picture-book form usually implies. The text quoted above is illustrated with a window holding a pot with three plants to express being loved, and then the same window shuttered without the pot to show “not,” just one instance where word and image interdependence is weak. Other pages are perhaps too literal: The page with text saying that learning can hurt sometimes has a big pink bandage above a red droplet of blood.
Ultimately, the book endeavors to send a message of hope and inspiration to its readers, but it ends up looking and reading more like a greeting card than a good picture book. Stick with Marla Frazee’s Walk On (2006), Dr. Seuss’ perennial best-seller Oh the Places You’ll Go (1990), or even Sandra Boynton’s more successful picture-book–cum–greeting-card Yay You! (2001). (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 12, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-7636-6488-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Templar/Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2013
Categories: CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES
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BOOK REVIEW
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 4, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
Categories: CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Whimsy, intelligence, and a subtle narrative thread make this rise to the top of a growing list of self-love titles.
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Employing a cast of diverse children reminiscent of that depicted in Another (2019), Robinson shows that every living entity has value.
After opening endpapers that depict an aerial view of a busy playground, the perspective shifts to a black child, ponytails tied with beaded elastics, peering into a microscope. So begins an exercise in perspective. From those bits of green life under the lens readers move to “Those who swim with the tide / and those who don’t.” They observe a “pest”—a mosquito biting a dinosaur, a “really gassy” planet, and a dog whose walker—a child in a pink hijab—has lost hold of the leash. Periodically, the examples are validated with the titular refrain. Textured paint strokes and collage elements contrast with uncluttered backgrounds that move from white to black to white. The black pages in the middle portion foreground scenes in space, including a black astronaut viewing Earth; the astronaut is holding an image of another black youngster who appears on the next spread flying a toy rocket and looking lonely. There are many such visual connections, creating emotional interest and invitations for conversation. The story’s conclusion spins full circle, repeating opening sentences with new scenarios. From the microscopic to the cosmic, word and image illuminate the message without a whiff of didacticism.
Whimsy, intelligence, and a subtle narrative thread make this rise to the top of a growing list of self-love titles. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-2169-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: March 15, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2020
Categories: CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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