Well-meaning and cute but ultimately slight.
A wee, willful penguin learns a valuable lesson on false assumptions—and friendship.
Penguins Percy and Posy warn their pal Plip to finish his fish snack so that Wal-the-Wump won’t snap it up. Plip pooh-poohs this notion, dismissing Wal-the-Wump as just a grumpy old walrus. The trio takes a refreshing swim, with Plip careful to keep his favorite toy, a cloth caterpillar that he calls Sockybug, from getting wet. After the swim, they play Wal-the-Wump games, pretending to be the big creature, until it’s time for a nap—but where’s Sockybug? All the penguins search high and low for the little toy, but there’s not a sign of Sockybug. Snow clouds gather, and the sky grows dark. It’s time to go home, but Plip won’t: “He’s my friend.” Suddenly remembering where he left Sockybug, Plip slides down a snowy hill, with Percy and Posy in hot pursuit. They run smack into Wal-the-Wump, so enormous that he takes up two pages of the book, turned sideways! Wal flashes his giant teeth and lets out a hearty “Ho, ho, ho!” Before long, all three penguins are romping with their huge new friend, and Plip makes each his own Sockybug. The story takes quite a long time to get to where it’s going, with little action to keep readers engaged. The illustrations are genial, if generic.
Well-meaning and cute but ultimately slight. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-62370-116-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Capstone Young Readers
Review Posted Online: Nov. 30, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2013
Though it initially treads some familiar territory, this European import sensitively takes readers into an emotional...
A little bear seeks reassurance from his mother that she will always love him.
At first, the question-and-answer session follows a familiar pattern. Little Bear has torn his jacket; will Mom still love him? What if he tore all his clothes? If he got bad marks at school? If he made a mess at home? With each query, Mom reassures him. To this point, there’s little remarkable about this book, but then it takes an unexpected turn: “There is something that still worries Little Bear very much, but he doesn’t dare ask….‘What if you died?’ ” Mom takes her time to answer, then tells him that of course she will, and he will feel it “deep inside.” Will she ever love someone else more? he asks, looking “at her round tummy.” The conversation plays itself out as Mom mends the torn jacket, Tharlet’s shaggy ursines posed against vast expanses of white space, the occasional window or chair indicating a domestic interior. The end is abrupt, and readers accustomed to resolution will feel that the loving dialogue has been cut off with a couple page turns yet to go. It honors the attention span of genuine preschoolers, though, realistically capturing their mercurial shifts in mood from existential wonder to absorption in immediate action.
Though it initially treads some familiar territory, this European import sensitively takes readers into an emotional frontier rarely explored. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-988-8240-51-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: minedition
Review Posted Online: Sept. 24, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
There’s lots to love here
A friendly little whodunit results in an unexpected romance between a bear and a bunny.
Bear lives in “a little cave, just big enough for him,” but it turns out that he has room for companionship. One morning he comes across a carrot lying on a flat rock, and not sure what it is, the bear decides to take a nibble. Delighted, he walks through the woods singing a song evocative of Winnie-the-Pooh’s hums. Two carrots appear the next day, and Bear begins to wonder who has left them. “Crunchy things! Three of them!” he exclaims on day three, and then he finds a whole pile of carrots on the fourth day. “Someone must like me to leave these good things,” he muses, and then he stumbles across a honey tree and decides to bring a piece of honeycomb for his secret admirer. This act of reciprocity instigates an ongoing gift exchange, culminating when the bear finds a bunny hiding in a bush. Mutual admiration overflows as the no-longer-secret admirers offer appreciation for the gifts they exchanged and then join in song at book’s end. While the story is awfully sweet, Hillenbrand’s mixed-media illustrations are what distinguish this picture book. Faintly rendered backgrounds offset characters and foreground settings, lending a truly fresh look to the compositions.
There’s lots to love here . (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Aug. 14, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-7636-4569-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
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