The tactile elements and factoids will make it high appeal for curious readers, who will overlook its imperfections.
In this nonfiction board book, animal facts are paired with touchable images.
From the creepy crawly to the slimy, each animal gets its own double-page spread complete with an up-close, detailed stock photograph. A touch-and-feel element is built into each animal’s image so that readers have a chance to interact with the fuzz on a tarantula and the velvety skin of a bat’s wing, for example. These touchable elements are largely successful. The actual stickiness of the frog’s tongue will impress little readers, and the subtle scales on the chameleon are well-integrated with the image. Others are less successful, however. The skunk’s tail is a swoop of plain white fuzz, and the tarantula’s “hairs,” while fun to touch, obscure the details underneath. The green-skinned PBS Kids characters accompany the animal images. The text itself is just the facts, rare for a board book. It introduces some great vocabulary, like predator and musk, but misses the opportunity to use the word nocturnal in both the bat and skunk entries. The book also assumes some prerequisite knowledge: Mammal is not explained, for example. This, coupled with the level of information shared, makes it an odd match for the board-book format.
The tactile elements and factoids will make it high appeal for curious readers, who will overlook its imperfections. (Board book. 3-5)Pub Date: Aug. 11, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-68052-950-0
Page Count: 10
Publisher: Cottage Door Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
A timely message in the wrong format.
This book delivers a message on the power of collective action.
As the book opens, a child looks at a lone star shining in the sky: “One star shines as distant light.” After the turn of the page, the child now sees what looks like the Milky Way: “And when stars shine together, they make our galaxy.” The book goes on to give a number of similar examples to reinforce the message of the power that comes from working together, ending with: “One of us can speak up for justice / And when we speak up together we create a world of possibility.” In the current atmosphere of strife and discord that divides our country, this is certainly a welcome message. Perhaps, though, the board-book set is not the right audience. As a picture book aimed at a slightly older group with an information page at the end explaining some of the illustrations, it might work well. As it is, however, some of the visual references will merely puzzle a toddler—and some adults. For example, a group of angry-looking people raising their fists and singing together may not look like “harmony” to a toddler—unless they know about the New Zealand haka. There is an unexplained frog motif that runs through the book that may also mystify readers. Nagara’s brilliant illustrations portray people of many ethnic backgrounds.
A timely message in the wrong format. (Board book. 3-5)Pub Date: Oct. 5, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-64421-084-0
Page Count: 44
Publisher: Triangle Square Books for Young Readers
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2021
A serene and lovely presentation.
Carter’s latest stop on his ongoing seasonal cycle offers pop-up pumpkins, corn, and other signs of mellow fruitfulness.
As in his Winter (2015) and Spring (2016), each opening presents a small, flat landscape dominated by a central pop-up, with scattered specimens of flora, insects, birds, and other wildlife—with identifying labels for most everything, even clouds—and leading questions below: “Who nibbles the water plants?” “Who hunts from the sky?” The setting is unspecified but has the look of the western United States, with glimpses of bison, California chicory, sockeye salmon, and a ringtail visible in various scenes, and a house visible in the distance that looks North American or European. Persimmons and pomegranates on the final spread broaden the general sense of locale a bit, though, and only early mention of “a chill in the air” pins the narrative to particular latitudes. Barred clouds (“altocumulus”) bloom on a soft dying day before the final observation that “Winter is coming; it’s time to harvest.”
A serene and lovely presentation. (Informational pop-up picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Aug. 29, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4197-2535-7
Page Count: 12
Publisher: Abrams Appleseed
Review Posted Online: June 18, 2017
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