While imaginary friends are a common theme in picture books, phantom animals offer a different twist—and the conceit may...
An elephantom? What’s that? A phantom elephant, of course.
When one turns up on Tuesday after dinner, the parents of the girl narrator don’t notice, not even when her bedroom begins to smell of dung. But the elephantom starts to bug the girl and get her into trouble, as when he invites his friends, who make a mess. The girl’s grandmother is the only one who understands the dilemma, as she has lots of ghost pets herself. She also has a business card for Mr. Spectral, and after an hours-long search, the girl finds his shop. He has the solution: a black box that contains something that will make the elephantom disappear. Where did he go? Check with the neighbors. The humor lies in the watercolor illustrations portraying the antics. Mr. Spectral’s shop shares street frontage with the World of Muesli, the Bucket Shop, Eyesore and Draintastic. The elephantom (and other ghost animals) is painted in pale gray. While it’s easy enough to pick the ghost animals out, too many of the spreads are composed with too little contrast among colors, making some scenes hard to discern.
While imaginary friends are a common theme in picture books, phantom animals offer a different twist—and the conceit may give kids an excuse to offer up when things go wrong. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: April 28, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-7636-7591-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Templar/Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A first-rate sharkfest, unusually nutritious for all its brevity.
Buzz and his buzzy buddy open a spinoff series of nonfiction early readers with an aquarium visit.
Buzz: “Like other fish, sharks breathe through gills.” Fly Guy: “GILLZZ.” Thus do the two pop-eyed cartoon tour guides squire readers past a plethora of cramped but carefully labeled color photos depicting dozens of kinds of sharks in watery settings, along with close-ups of skin, teeth and other anatomical features. In the bite-sized blocks of narrative text, challenging vocabulary words like “carnivores” and “luminescence” come with pronunciation guides and lucid in-context definitions. Despite all the flashes of dentifrice and references to prey and smelling blood in the water, there is no actual gore or chowing down on display. Sharks are “so cool!” proclaims Buzz at last, striding out of the gift shop. “I can’t wait for our next field trip!” (That will be Fly Guy Presents: Space, scheduled for September 2013.)
A first-rate sharkfest, unusually nutritious for all its brevity. (Informational easy reader. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-545-50771-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Feb. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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