A not-so-ordinary raincoat holds hidden possibilities. Emily’s disgruntlement knows no bounds when she receives a too-big orange raincoat, so when she yells out, “I wish it fit me!” and it magically shrinks to just-right, she quickly reassesses the situation. In fairly short order, she turns her brother into a dog and wishes for both a million dollars and a purple gorilla. But when she wishes that her daddy were home all the time and he suddenly loses his job, Emily realizes that wishing can be dangerous. Onto this homely fable is hung energetic collage artwork. Handmade paper in rich hues and almost-palpable textures form the appropriately surreal backgrounds; Emily, a cheery sprite with blue-and-purple hair, cavorts across the page, the only truly distinct figure amid the textured collages and scratchy ink drawings. The resolution, in which Emily’s mother trades the neighbor girl for a yellow raincoat and Emily sees the evidence of its magic run amok, is just right—trading for it back, Emily hangs it in the closet “for a rainy day.” Who ever thought a raincoat could be so much fun? (Picture book. 3-7)
Pub Date: March 1, 2007
ISBN: 978-1-932425-68-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Front Street/Boyds Mills
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2007
As ephemeral as a valentine.
Daywalt and Jeffers’ wandering crayons explore love.
Each double-page spread offers readers a vision of one of the anthropomorphic crayons on the left along with the statement “Love is [color].” The word love is represented by a small heart in the appropriate color. Opposite, childlike crayon drawings explain how that color represents love. So, readers learn, “love is green. / Because love is helpful.” The accompanying crayon drawing depicts two alligators, one holding a recycling bin and the other tossing a plastic cup into it, offering readers two ways of understanding green. Some statements are thought-provoking: “Love is white. / Because sometimes love is hard to see,” reaches beyond the immediate image of a cat’s yellow eyes, pink nose, and black mouth and whiskers, its white face and body indistinguishable from the paper it’s drawn on, to prompt real questions. “Love is brown. / Because sometimes love stinks,” on the other hand, depicted by a brown bear standing next to a brown, squiggly turd, may provoke giggles but is fundamentally a cheap laugh. Some of the color assignments have a distinctly arbitrary feel: Why is purple associated with the imagination and pink with silliness? Fans of The Day the Crayons Quit (2013) hoping for more clever, metaliterary fun will be disappointed by this rather syrupy read.
As ephemeral as a valentine. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Dec. 24, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5247-9268-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
A comical, fresh look at crayons and color.
Duncan wants to draw, but instead of crayons, he finds a stack of letters listing the crayons’ demands in this humorous tale.
Red is overworked, laboring even on holidays. Gray is exhausted from coloring expansive spaces (elephants, rhinos and whales). Black wants to be considered a color-in color, and Peach? He’s naked without his wrapper! This anthropomorphized lot amicably requests workplace changes in hand-lettered writing, explaining their work stoppage to a surprised Duncan. Some are tired, others underutilized, while a few want official titles. With a little creativity and a lot of color, Duncan saves the day. Jeffers delivers energetic and playful illustrations, done in pencil, paint and crayon. The drawings are loose and lively, and with few lines, he makes his characters effectively emote. Clever spreads, such as Duncan’s “white cat in the snow” perfectly capture the crayons’ conundrum, and photographic representations of both the letters and coloring pages offer another layer of texture, lending to the tale’s overall believability.
A comical, fresh look at crayons and color. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: June 27, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-399-25537-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: April 14, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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