Charming, entertaining, and full of heart.
It’s normal to be nervous on moving day, especially when you’ve been in the same place for more than 100 years.
Anthropomorphized by spindly, stockinged legs and pointy boots, an ornate Victorian home on a cozy San Francisco street nervously steps onto a flatbed trailer—and so the journey begins. A parade ensues as curious neighbors gather, children ride their bikes alongside the trailer, and a police escort leads the way. Teetering and tottering, the house waits as tree trimmers cut low branches and utility workers remove street signs to make way for the oversize caravan. The bashful and bruised house wonders when this will all be over before finally spotting the new residents: a multiracial family of five who smile and wave from an empty lot. Settling in, the house misses being in the old neighborhood, but the new family’s love and the comforting sound of the ice cream truck make for a sweet, empathetic conclusion to a daunting adventure. Dynamic ink and watercolor illustrations lend the house a lively personality and depict a diverse crowd of bystanders. Careful readers will notice delightful details such as flowering bushes on either side of the house that transform into giant, floral-patterned carpet bags, clutched tightly to the house’s sides by curling ivy arms. An author’s note discusses the book’s inspiration—a real-life San Francisco home that was moved six blocks in 2021.
Charming, entertaining, and full of heart. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: March 11, 2025
ISBN: 9780823452590
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Margaret Ferguson/Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025
Sure to have little ones giggling.
Jacques is a hedgehog with a big secret: “I wear real, bona fide underwear.”
Our narrator received a mysterious package one day; an illustration shows a pair of underwear tied to a balloon with a note “from the Universe” floating down into Jacques’ burrow. Hedgehogs don’t wear underwear, however. Will Jacques be shunned? Jacques worries but comes to a decision: “I have to wear them. When I do I feel special.” Determined, Jacques, who’s been invited to a party, makes a dramatic entrance, with undies in hand. Jacques’ declaration (“I WEAR UNDERWEAR”) is met with remarks of dismay, before another hedgehog opens up about similar fears and shows off a pair of cowboy boots. More hedgehogs introduce themselves with their own confessions. The story ends with Jacques unveiling a painting of the underwear in a gallery filled with hedgehogs wearing all sorts of attire. Though the book is simple in plot, characters, and setting, it wins in its balance of bathroom humor, dramatic storytelling, and celebrations of individual expression. French words are peppered throughout, adding to the fun without detracting from the story for those unfamiliar with the language. The cartoonish illustrations brim with fun; Valdez relies heavily on geometric shapes (triangle noses for the hedgehogs; huge circles for their eyes). Details such as speech bubbles and recurring turtle and snake characters contribute to the outlandish humor.
Sure to have little ones giggling. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: April 1, 2025
ISBN: 9781250814388
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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