by Tedd Arnold ; illustrated by Tedd Arnold ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 15, 2014
An inept commander and his clueless robot—there are lots of satisfying possibilities there, and Arnold taps into them.
A “remote operating basic utility gizmo”—call him Robug for short—comes to clean Jake the dog’s mess, turning the house into hash in the process.
Arnold is always a bit of a wild man, and he brings that vibrancy here in both a narrative straining at its compression—“I will fix this mess!” is Robug’s refrain—and an artwork of inviting tactility. Readers would gladly dive into one of those plush chairs, even if they are covered with junk. Robug is a close kin to one of those swimming-pool cleaners that crawls contentedly about on the bottom. Robug, though, is a catastrophic dust storm, moving the mess from room to room to roof without ever getting anything put away. Finally, with a look in its eye like a teacher who isn’t going to take any more guff, Robug gets Jake cracking. This is a good, simple and funny tale, a pleasing eyeful working on a familiar motif: the sweep-it-under-the-rug style of cleaning, the cram-it-in-the-closet or shove-it-under-the-bed approach to household management, even the old shove-it-around-on-the-plate trick to pretend you at least tried the cold rutabaga salad. It hits the spot for beginning readers, and read-alongs are welcome, perhaps inevitable.
An inept commander and his clueless robot—there are lots of satisfying possibilities there, and Arnold taps into them. (Early reader. 4-8)Pub Date: March 15, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-8234-2942-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2014
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by Rae Crawford ; illustrated by Rae Crawford
by Steve Henry ; illustrated by Steve Henry
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by Dev Petty ; illustrated by Lauren Eldridge ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 20, 2017
The dynamic interaction between the characters invites readers to take risks, push boundaries, and have a little unscripted...
Reinvention is the name of the game for two blobs of clay.
A blue-eyed gray blob and a brown-eyed brown blob sit side by side, unsure as to what’s going to happen next. The gray anticipates an adventure, while the brown appears apprehensive. A pair of hands descends, and soon, amid a flurry of squishing and prodding and poking and sculpting, a handsome gray wolf and a stately brown owl emerge. The hands disappear, leaving the friends to their own devices. The owl is pleased, but the wolf convinces it that the best is yet to come. An ear pulled here and an extra eye placed there, and before you can shake a carving stick, a spurt of frenetic self-exploration—expressed as a tangled black scribble—reveals a succession of smug hybrid beasts. After all, the opportunity to become a “pig-e-phant” doesn’t come around every day. But the sound of approaching footsteps panics the pair of Picassos. How are they going to “fix [them]selves” on time? Soon a hippopotamus and peacock are staring bug-eyed at a returning pair of astonished hands. The creative naiveté of the “clay mates” is perfectly captured by Petty’s feisty, spot-on dialogue: “This was your idea…and it was a BAD one.” Eldridge’s endearing sculpted images are photographed against the stark white background of an artist’s work table to great effect.
The dynamic interaction between the characters invites readers to take risks, push boundaries, and have a little unscripted fun of their own . (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: June 20, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-316-30311-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2017
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by Alexandra Penfold ; illustrated by Suzanne Kaufman ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 2, 2021
The story’s slight but allows kids to practice identifying and dealing with their own big feelings.
The diverse group of kids from All Are Welcome (2018) this time gathers in a vacant lot with tools in hand to clear the debris and make something new. But therein lies the rub: What should the something new be? While the exact nature of the disagreement is unfortunately not made clear to readers, the big feelings that the children exhibit are very clear (and for readers who need practice reading facial clues, there’s a labeled chart of 15 in the frontmatter). This book’s refrain is “How can I help? / What can we do?” And the answers, spread over several pages and not spelled out in so many words but rather shown in the illustrations, are: talk it through, compromise, and see things from another perspective. As a guide for dealing with feelings and problem-solving, the book is a bit slim and lacks a solid story to hook readers. But, as with its predecessor, its strength is again the diversity on display in its pages. There’s a rainbow of skin tones and hair colors as well as abundant variation in hair texture, several children exhibit visible disabilities, including one child who uses a wheelchair, and there are markers of religious and cultural diversity. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at 29.6% of actual size.)
The story’s slight but allows kids to practice identifying and dealing with their own big feelings. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: March 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-525-57974-8
Page Count: 42
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Dec. 24, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2021
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