This ambitious flight to Neverland crashes and burns from the get-go.
The vastly abridged text runs to quick summaries and paraphrased lines like “Take a right after the second star and then go straight until morning!” and accompanies cartoon-style illustrations replete with small figures that fly, gesticulate, pop into view or otherwise move at a touch. Those and a font toggle and vowel highlighter on every page are about the only features that work well, however. The page turns are balky, pausing the audio narration (offered in four languages, plus a self-record option), as are many of the textual features. An "explain to me" tab at the bottom highlights selected words; tapping on them will (sometimes) trigger an automated pronunciation and open explanatory windows that are more or less helpful. Touching "following," for instance, brings up the baffling "going before"; if readers notice that the "opposite" tab at the bottom of that pop up is highlighted, they might deduce that it is an antonym for the word that they wanted explained. Sweeping “fairy dust” across any screen from a pot at the bottom cuts off the narration. In the art, Neverland’s stereotypical Indians are joined on other pages by glimpses of a spear-carrying African and an Arab with a rifle. Sophisticated animations are wasted on an app that is still several major updates short of mediocrity. (iPad storybook app. 5-8)
Pub Date: Nov. 30, 2011
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Chocolapps
Review Posted Online: Dec. 12, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
Only for dedicated fans of the series.
When a kid gets the part of the ninja master in the school play, it finally seems to be the right time to tackle the closet monster.
“I spot my monster right away. / He’s practicing his ROAR. / He almost scares me half to death, / but I won’t be scared anymore!” The monster is a large, fluffy poison-green beast with blue hands and feet and face and a fluffy blue-and-green–striped tail. The kid employs a “bag of tricks” to try to catch the monster: in it are a giant wind-up shark, two cans of silly string, and an elaborate cage-and-robot trap. This last works, but with an unexpected result: the monster looks sad. Turns out he was only scaring the boy to wake him up so they could be friends. The monster greets the boy in the usual monster way: he “rips a massive FART!!” that smells like strawberries and lime, and then they go to the monster’s house to meet his parents and play. The final two spreads show the duo getting ready for bed, which is a rather anticlimactic end to what has otherwise been a rambunctious tale. Elkerton’s bright illustrations have a TV-cartoon aesthetic, and his playful beast is never scary. The narrator is depicted with black eyes and hair and pale skin. Wallace’s limping verses are uninspired at best, and the scansion and meter are frequently off.
Only for dedicated fans of the series. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4926-4894-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
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