A fine choice for lift-the-flap fans, but touch-and-feel enthusiasts should try other offerings.
A lift-the-flap and touch-and-feel peekaboo experience for little ones.
On the left side of each spread, the text poses a variety of questions about Bunny’s whereabouts. One image (a bird, a mushroom, or a dragonfly) from the much busier right-hand side appears front and center. On the right, readers are encouraged to lift a relatively sturdy, shaped flap embedded in the landscape to see if Bunny is hiding underneath. Behind the first four flaps, youngsters encounter a lamb, a hedgehog, a deer and a badger in their habitats, and each creature features a small textural element. On the last page and below the final flap, Bunny nibbles on cabbages behind a garden gate. Berg’s clear, stylized cartoons in rich colors are both simple and detailed, making them easy for little ones who are learning to name their world. Unfortunately, the tactile components are really too small to be satisfying, and the textures do not always connect with their host (a smooth hedgehog and a ribbed carrot?). The sister title, Have You Seen Duck?, follows the same text and layout patterns, but this time, it’s Duck who’s on the loose. The textural elements here are better matched, but they still run on the small side. In both titles, the black text against a dark blue background on a couple pages is difficult to read.
Pub Date: June 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-40831-499-9
Page Count: 12
Publisher: Trafalgar Square
Review Posted Online: May 21, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2013
An excellent, rounded effort from a creator who knows how to deliver.
The farmyard's chickens experience Halloween.
A round, full moon shines in the sky, and the chickens of Boynton's barnyard are feeling “nervous.” Pumpkins shine “with flickering eyes,” witches and wizards wander the pastures, and one chicken has seen “a mouse of enormous size.” It’s Halloween night, and readers will delight as the chickens huddle together and try to figure out what's going on. All ends well, of course, and in Boynton's trademark silly style. (It’s really quite remarkable how her ranks of white, yellow-beaked chickens evoke rows of candy corn.) At this point parents and children know what they're in for when they pick up a book by the prolific author, and she doesn't disappoint here. The chickens are silly, the pigs are cute, and the coloring and illustrations evoke a warmth that little ones wary of Halloween will appreciate. For children leery of the ghouls and goblins lurking in the holiday's iconography, this is a perfect antidote, emphasizing all the fun Halloween has to offer.
An excellent, rounded effort from a creator who knows how to deliver. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Aug. 23, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-7611-9300-5
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Workman
Review Posted Online: Sept. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
An upbeat early book on feelings with a simple storyline that little ones will respond to.
This simplified version of Diesen and Hanna’s The Pout-Pout Fish (2008) is appropriate for babies and toddlers.
Brief, rhyming text tells the story of a sullen fish cheered up with a kiss. A little pink sea creature pokes his head out of a hole in the sea bottom to give the gloomy fish some advice: “Smile, Mr. Fish! / You look so down // With your glum-glum face / And your pout-pout frown.” He explains that there’s no reason to be worried, scared, sad or mad and concludes: “How about a smooch? / And a cheer-up wish? // Now you look happy: / What a smile, Mr. Fish!” Simple and sweet, this tale offers the lesson that sometimes, all that’s needed for a turnaround in mood is some cheer and encouragement to change our perspective. The clean, uncluttered illustrations are kept simple, except for the pout-pout fish’s features, which are delightfully expressive. Little ones will easily recognize and likely try to copy the sad, scared and angry looks that cross the fish’s face.
An upbeat early book on feelings with a simple storyline that little ones will respond to. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-374-37084-8
Page Count: 12
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014
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