A child coming off chemotherapy wins new friends and acceptance from her class in this short, upbeat tale from Hamilton (Second Cousins, 1998, etc.). At first, Dreenie doesn’t know what to make of the girl, Natalie, who is in a wheelchair and knit cap, and who is called “Bluish” by the fifth graders not because she’s black and Jewish (as Natalie’s mother assumes), but because her skin is translucent. New herself, Dreenie quickly finds the right mix of distance and intimacy to be comfortable around her moody, fragile classmate, and soon others are gathering, too—especially after Natalie presents everyone with a wool cap like hers. Hamilton tells the tale from Dreenie’s point of view, moving back and forth between first and third person, sketching feelings and reactions in quick, vivid strokes: “[Bluish] made me care about what was all so scary, so sad and so hurt with her too. To me she is just Bluish child, Bluish ill serious. Bluish close with us. Someday Bluish just like us./Maybe.” While Natalie’s future remains clouded, the story’s tone is set by the pains, and the pleasures, of the moment: exchanging gifts, banter, friendship, and respect. The three children in Leo and Diane Dillons’ jacket painting are misleadingly grave, but the designs in their knit caps and scarves evoke the author’s poetic, richly textured prose. (Fiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-590-28879-2
Page Count: 127
Publisher: Blue Sky/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1999
The way-off-road vehicle (The Magic School Bus and the Electric Field, 1997, etc.) tours the ears, eyes, nose, and skin when the assistant principal, Mr. Wilde, accidentally shrinks the school bus and the children on board, commandeering it to deliver a message to Ms. Frizzle. The vehicle plunges into the eye of a police officer, where the students explore the pupil, the cornea, the retina, and the optic nerve leading to the brain. Then it’s on to other senses, via the ear of a small child, the nose of a dog, and the tongue of the Friz herself. Sidebars and captions add to the blizzard of information here; with a combination of plot, details, and jokes, the trip is anything but dull. The facts will certainly entice readers to learn more about the ways living creatures perceive the world. (Picture book. 6-9)
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-590-44697-5
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1999
IN THE NEWS
This entry in a series for very new readers has few words and clear rhymes: “Popcorn. Popcorn./Put it in a pot./Popcorn. Popcorn./Get the pot hot.” In a Fauvist kitchen, a multicolored cast of characters—purple and blue dogs, a fuchsia cat, a boy and a girl (he’s African-American; she’s Latina) put those kernels in a big kettle. “Popcorn. Popcorn./Pop! Pop! Pop!/Popcorn. Popcorn./Stop! Stop! Stop!” The fluffy kernels spill out the door into the green and gold world, where other folk come to get their own bags full. “Popcorn. Popcorn./Get it while it’s hot./We are happy./We like it a lot.” Children who are just beginning to master the connection of word to object will adore this, and marvel that they can, indeed, read it. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-15-201998-7
Page Count: 20
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1999
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