Roth (My Love for You, 1996, etc.) honors the memory of her Chinese uncle through her story, which is partially based on her uncle's immigrant experiences and his talents as a poet and calligrapher. Mr. Kang celebrates his 70th birthday by announcing he will retire after 50 years as a cook in a Chinese restaurant. He wants to read the New York Times every day, paint poems in Chinese calligraphy, and keep a special kind of Chinese bird, a hua mei, in a cage that he can take to the park like the other retired Chinese men in his neighborhood in Brooklyn. Mr. Kang's seven-year-old grandson, Sam, objects to keeping a bird caged, but when the bird is given the chance to go free, it returns to Mr. Kang's apartment and its cage. This lovely, quiet story has a satisfying conclusion as Mr. Kang paints a poem, Sam paints a picture, and the bird paints a little picture of its own with delicate footprints. Roth's elegant collage illustrations are a delight to peruse, incorporating paper-cut figures, rice papers, brocades, feathers, newspaper scraps, and photographs to create a dynamic flow of art. Text is place carefully within its own frame on top of one side of each exquisitely crafted two-page spread. An author's note offers more details about the Chinese tradition of retired men keeping caged birds as pets as well as details about her collage materials. For its art, for its celebration of a venerable grandfather, and for a special look at a unique custom, this is a story to be treasured. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-7922-7723-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: National Geographic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
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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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A first-rate sharkfest, unusually nutritious for all its brevity.
Buzz and his buzzy buddy open a spinoff series of nonfiction early readers with an aquarium visit.
Buzz: “Like other fish, sharks breathe through gills.” Fly Guy: “GILLZZ.” Thus do the two pop-eyed cartoon tour guides squire readers past a plethora of cramped but carefully labeled color photos depicting dozens of kinds of sharks in watery settings, along with close-ups of skin, teeth and other anatomical features. In the bite-sized blocks of narrative text, challenging vocabulary words like “carnivores” and “luminescence” come with pronunciation guides and lucid in-context definitions. Despite all the flashes of dentifrice and references to prey and smelling blood in the water, there is no actual gore or chowing down on display. Sharks are “so cool!” proclaims Buzz at last, striding out of the gift shop. “I can’t wait for our next field trip!” (That will be Fly Guy Presents: Space, scheduled for September 2013.)
A first-rate sharkfest, unusually nutritious for all its brevity. (Informational easy reader. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-545-50771-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Feb. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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