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BABY BRIGHT

Name: BABY BRIGHT
Author: Samantha Meredith
ISBN: 978-1-58925-583-8

From the My First Sparkly Book series

by Samantha Meredith ; illustrated by Samantha Meredith ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2014

A genial and gentle offering for the youngest readers.

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Simple graphics in black, white, green, yellow and gold foil introduce babies to a variety of animals and objects.

Each page features one image with a caption in a bold, black type. Most of the objects facing each other across the spread are natural pairs (sun/hat and mouse/cheese), but a couple feel arbitrarily joined (balloon/bee and chick/tractor). The representations are clear and understandable for little ones learning to label the world. Squiggly lines and floating graphics add interest to the spreads, and subtle embossing adds a textural element as well. Baby Shine, another in the series, uses the same format to present additional paired images (socks/shoes and leaf/caterpillar), with embellishments in green foil this time. The width of the pages of both titles slowly increases as the pages are turned. This won’t assist little hands with page-turns as was probably the intention, but it does offer some tactile appeal.

A genial and gentle offering for the youngest readers. (Board book. 0-1)

Pub Date: March 1, 2014

ISBN: 978-1-58925-583-8

Page Count: 12

Publisher: Tiger Tales

Review Posted Online: May 3, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS

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LITTLE DAYMOND LEARNS TO EARN

by Daymond John ; illustrated by Nicole Miles ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 21, 2023

It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists.

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How to raise money for a coveted poster: put your friends to work!

John, founder of the FUBU fashion line and a Shark Tank venture capitalist, offers a self-referential blueprint for financial success. Having only half of the $10 he needs for a Minka J poster, Daymond forks over $1 to buy a plain T-shirt, paints a picture of the pop star on it, sells it for $5, and uses all of his cash to buy nine more shirts. Then he recruits three friends to decorate them with his design and help sell them for an unspecified amount (from a conveniently free and empty street-fair booth) until they’re gone. The enterprising entrepreneur reimburses himself for the shirts and splits the remaining proceeds, which leaves him with enough for that poster as well as a “brand-new business book,” while his friends express other fiscal strategies: saving their share, spending it all on new art supplies, or donating part and buying a (math) book with the rest. (In a closing summation, the author also suggests investing in stocks, bonds, or cryptocurrency.) Though Miles cranks up the visual energy in her sparsely detailed illustrations by incorporating bright colors and lots of greenbacks, the actual advice feels a bit vague. Daymond is Black; most of the cast are people of color. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists. (Picture book. 7-9)

Pub Date: March 21, 2023

ISBN: 978-0-593-56727-2

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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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)