Familiar seasonal fun for the young.
This exploration of seasons featuring a multicultural group of preschoolers is sure to please its target audience.
Using a combination of printmaking techniques and nontraditional art supplies (plastic lace, vinyl fabric, erasers and more), Chodos-Irvine leads viewers through the textures of a changing landscape and the actions that accompany the seasonal phenomena. From puddle-jumping through a spring storm and finding insects among summer blossoms to jumping in leaf piles and catching snowflakes, these youngsters are engaged with their environment. Naberhaus employs two or four words per double-page spread in her sound poem: “BOOM BOOM // Flash! Flash! // drip drip // Splash! / splash!” Some words appear to be included because they rhyme, not because they are actually appropriately onomatopoeic, a choice that weakens the text somewhat; no one says or really hears “fuzz fuzz” when blowing a dandelion, but nevertheless it follows “buzz buzz.” Similarly, is “silent // silent” really necessary in the quiet snow scene? Those points aside, very young children will benefit from the repetition and enjoy the range of perspectives and emotions provided by the artist who created Ella Sarah Gets Dressed (2003).
Familiar seasonal fun for the young. (Picture book. 2-4)Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4424-3412-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 28, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
There are just too many cooks in this kitchen.
Pim has quite the appetite and one unusual palate.
Little Pim the panda scours his pantry for something to eat. Tabs and lift-the-flaps feature three possible ingredients on each page to add to the meal; each one is described in three different languages (English, Spanish and French). Crowded type in various colors and itty-bitty phonetic pronunciations make these labels hard to read. Beginning with bread for his sandwich (the other flaps conceal carrots and apples), Pim’s tastes demonstrate a toddlerlike eclecticism. He crams a hodgepodge of foodstuffs (seven potato chips, nine marshmallows, etc.) into his towering sandwich. The fake enthusiasm grates. Pim juggles apples as the narrator urges readers to join in: “Making a sandwich is fun! Now Little Pim needs six slices of cheese. Can you help him find them?” A concluding spread depicts his final culinary masterpiece. Animals brings Pim and his camera to photograph farm animals, with a similar interactive design.
There are just too many cooks in this kitchen. (Board book. 2-3)Pub Date: April 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4197-0175-7
Page Count: 10
Publisher: Abrams Appleseed
Review Posted Online: June 12, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2012
In bold yellow on a glossy blue background, a clean shape introduces itself: “Dot.” Next are “Stop dot” and “Go dot,”...
Unexpected bright spots and laughs roll right over the uneven text in this concept piece.
In bold yellow on a glossy blue background, a clean shape introduces itself: “Dot.” Next are “Stop dot” and “Go dot,” predictably red and green. A “[l]oud” Pac-man–esque dot sits across from its “quiet” counterpart, which is similar but has a tiny mouth. A dot missing a jagged bite is “yummy,” while its partner, similarly bitten but with the bite lying nearby as if spit out, “tastes bad.” Weaker pairs glean definition only through heavy-handed contrast. Some dots are abstract: A shy dot’s mostly missing, as if hiding behind a white square, but because the background’s also white, the square must be inferred. The delightful bits are Intriago’s mid-book leaps away from her own setup. Out of the blue, photographed human hands appear to poke a hard and a soft dot, and “Got dots”—a Dalmatian photo—contrasts with “Not dots”—a zebra. These diversions are surprisingly funny. The weakness here is text, which vacillates between rhyming/scanning completely and not, with one glaring miss: “Stop dot / Go dot // Slow dot / fast dot” yearns to swap “slow” and “fast” for the rhyme.Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-31835-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Margaret Ferguson/Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Review Posted Online: July 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2011
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