A captivating, tender, and enjoyable genre winner for canine lovers.
A fictional autobiography focuses on a local Panacea, Florida, celebrity: a stray yellow dog who learns to depend on himself and the kindness of one special fan.
Surf Dude introduces himself in Andrews’ opening paragraph in lines that poignantly establish the emotional construct of the narrative’s protagonist: “I’m just your average yellow dog that once was loved, but became a drifter unexpectedly. I’m not sure what I’m looking for, perhaps a place where thunder, shotguns, fireworks, and mean people with cowboy boots don’t exist.” The canine was born in the woods of South Carolina. One fateful day, while his Mama was busy stalking prey, the pup was grabbed and tossed into a pickup truck by Leo, a large man wearing pointy boots. Leo drove home and threw the puppy into the lap of his girlfriend, Jorene. Despite his fear of humans, Leo in particular, the puppy became devoted to Jorene, who named him Honeybun and showered him with affection. Life changed the day Leo attacked Jorene. “I didn’t mean to do what I did,” Honeybun tells readers. “Jorene was my pack, and he was threatening her. I jumped up on the bed and sank my teeth into his forearm, right over his new tattoo.” It was time for Jorene and Honeybun to leave. They headed for the Florida Panhandle, where they spent several happy years in a campground trailer. Then tragedy struck, and Honeybun began his adventures as a loner wandering Surf Road. The articulate novel is based loosely on the real Surf Dude (thought to be a Carolina dog or a Carolina mix), who has inspired his own Facebook page and who still roams around Panacea and its environs, occasionally posing for photographs—if folks keep their distance. Andrews infuses her wily, resourceful pooch with a delightful, realistically canine interpretation of the world. She is a skillful storyteller, and her narrative engagingly mixes light humor, a bit of pathos, and assorted adventures with the compelling tale of Surf Dude’s cautiously evolving friendship with Russ, the older man who feeds him twice a day.
A captivating, tender, and enjoyable genre winner for canine lovers.Pub Date: July 19, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-947536-09-8
Page Count: 117
Publisher: Turtle Cove Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.
A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.
Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come.
Little Blue Truck and his pal Toad meet friends old and new on a springtime drive through the country.
This lift-the-flap, interactive entry in the popular Little Blue Truck series lacks the narrative strength and valuable life lessons of the original Little Blue Truck (2008) and its sequel, Little Blue Truck Leads the Way (2009). Both of those books, published for preschoolers rather than toddlers, featured rich storylines, dramatic, kinetic illustrations, and simple but valuable life lessons—the folly of taking oneself too seriously, the importance of friends, and the virtue of taking turns, for example. At about half the length and with half as much text as the aforementioned titles, this volume is a much quicker read. Less a story than a vernal celebration, the book depicts a bucolic drive through farmland and encounters with various animals and their young along the way. Beautifully rendered two-page tableaux teem with butterflies, blossoms, and vibrant pastel, springtime colors. Little Blue greets a sheep standing in the door of a barn: “Yoo-hoo, Sheep! / Beep-beep! / What’s new?” Folding back the durable, card-stock flap reveals the barn’s interior and an adorable set of twin lambs. Encounters with a duck and nine ducklings, a cow with a calf, a pig with 10 (!) piglets, a family of bunnies, and a chicken with a freshly hatched chick provide ample opportunity for counting and vocabulary work.
Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come. (Board book. 1-4)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-544-93809-0
Page Count: 16
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
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