A fanciful tale that’s likely to delight young readers.
Kanter and Kanter St. Amour’s picture book presents a modern-day fable of money and greed.
Armando and his wife, Elisa, have four children and live a comfortable life on the estate of wealthy Giuliano Cantore. Elisa is “endowed with fanciful ideas—but also a pragmatist.” Armando, meanwhile, “wished to buy Giuliano’s estate someday,” and keeps his life savings of gold coins in a small wine barrel. Early on, the narrator introduces readers to “Puttifurbi”—beings who mysteriously and mischievously move people’s possessions around. One day, Armando awakens to happily discover that “eleven gold coins tumbled from his tousled hair and onto the wood-planked floor.” This apparent “gift from the angels” continues nightly, but Elisa believes it’s a Puttifurbi prank. The authors weave a rich, traditional fable, frequently addressing “Dear reader” and offering reminders about “olden times.” Textual imagery will help young readers see the story in their mind’s eye: “the cold winter sun hung low like a pink jewel on the horizon.” It’s a clever tale with lessons about envy and avarice mingled with humor, with an ending that includes a major real-life historical figure. Secondary characters, such as Elise’s grandmother, Lucia, and Armando’s brother, Marco, are also entertaining. Philtjens’ illustrations complement the text well with their whimsical style and rich, warm colors.
A fanciful tale that’s likely to delight young readers.Pub Date: May 14, 2023
ISBN: 9798986446141
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Pactum Factum Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
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 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Visually accomplished but marred by stereotypical cultural depictions.
Ellis, known for her illustrations for Colin Meloy’s Wildwood series, here riffs on the concept of “home.”
Shifting among homes mundane and speculative, contemporary and not, Ellis begins and ends with views of her own home and a peek into her studio. She highlights palaces and mansions, but she also takes readers to animal homes and a certain famously folkloric shoe (whose iconic Old Woman manages a passel of multiethnic kids absorbed in daring games). One spread showcases “some folks” who “live on the road”; a band unloads its tour bus in front of a theater marquee. Ellis’ compelling ink and gouache paintings, in a palette of blue-grays, sepia and brick red, depict scenes ranging from mythical, underwater Atlantis to a distant moonscape. Another spread, depicting a garden and large building under connected, transparent domes, invites readers to wonder: “Who in the world lives here? / And why?” (Earth is seen as a distant blue marble.) Some of Ellis’ chosen depictions, oddly juxtaposed and stripped of any historical or cultural context due to the stylized design and spare text, become stereotypical. “Some homes are boats. / Some homes are wigwams.” A sailing ship’s crew seems poised to land near a trio of men clad in breechcloths—otherwise unidentified and unremarked upon.
Visually accomplished but marred by stereotypical cultural depictions. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 24, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-7636-6529-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
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