A satisfying choice for picky readers.
Lunch dates get a little sweeter when two friends bring the art of compromise to their menus.
Kat (a blue feline) and Mouse (a darker blue rodent) are getting together for lunch. Kat has packed “the most delicious sandwich! It has BACON, LETTUCE, and TOMATO.” Kat dubs this feast “the BLT.” Mouse has brought a delectable meal, too. “Only the BEST food there is! CHEESE!” Over the next few days, the pair again meet to share mealtimes. Kat totes increasingly elaborate picnic setups and sandwiches, while Mouse packs a modest, star-speckled lunchbox of flavorful cheeses. Sensitive to Kat’s perception of this apparent monotony, Mouse worries: “Maybe I’m boring.” After a trial lunch apart proves “AWFUL” for Kat and makes Mouse’s blue cheese taste “bluer than usual,” the pair agree that their happy mix of habits makes for a healthy friendship. Brightly colored digital art with thick outlines frames the gentle-faced, cartoonish characters on visually clean backgrounds in a variety of page layouts; some pages are divided into graphic novel–esque panels. Beginning readers will find the minimal text helpful; it appears in a bold font within clearly attributed and color-coded speech bubbles (pink for Kat, green for Mouse). This cheery series starter shares the tender social-emotional lessons of similar titles starring animal pals, like Mo Willems’ Elephant and Piggie series or Ben Clanton’s Narwhal and Jelly tales.
A satisfying choice for picky readers. (Early reader. 5-7)Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781547612420
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
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
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Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back.
With such short arms, how can Tiny T. Rex give a sad friend a hug?
Fleck goes for cute in the simple, minimally detailed illustrations, drawing the diminutive theropod with a chubby turquoise body and little nubs for limbs under a massive, squared-off head. Impelled by the sight of stegosaurian buddy Pointy looking glum, little Tiny sets out to attempt the seemingly impossible, a comforting hug. Having made the rounds seeking advice—the dino’s pea-green dad recommends math; purple, New Age aunt offers cucumber juice (“That is disgusting”); red mom tells him that it’s OK not to be able to hug (“You are tiny, but your heart is big!”), and blue and yellow older sibs suggest practice—Tiny takes up the last as the most immediately useful notion. Unfortunately, the “tree” the little reptile tries to hug turns out to be a pterodactyl’s leg. “Now I am falling,” Tiny notes in the consistently self-referential narrative. “I should not have let go.” Fortunately, Tiny lands on Pointy’s head, and the proclamation that though Rexes’ hugs may be tiny, “I will do my very best because you are my very best friend” proves just the mood-lightening ticket. “Thank you, Tiny. That was the biggest hug ever.” Young audiences always find the “clueless grown-ups” trope a knee-slapper, the overall tone never turns preachy, and Tiny’s instinctive kindness definitely puts him at (gentle) odds with the dinky dino star of Bob Shea’s Dinosaur Vs. series.
Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: March 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4521-7033-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 11, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
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