An imaginative adventure story whose elaborate illustrations inspire wonder, careful examination and multiple reads.
Ignored by her digitally distracted family, a girl draws a red door on her bedroom wall and steps through.
A lush green forest twinkles with lanterns and strung lights; a dizzying castle towers, its gates, turrets and halls linked by complicated waterways; a hovering aircraft festooned with propellers and wheels holds an imprisoned purple-plumed bird. Amid these marvels, the girl appears markedly ordinary with her common pageboy haircut, minimal facial features and simple clothes. She could be anyone, really, and readers will easily appropriate her journey as their own. Putty-colored grays and flat, boxy city shapes defined the girl’s urban reality, but here, color rules, modulating from mossy greens to slate blues to dusky purple—all punctuated with her crayon’s brilliant red and the yellow of a golden bird cage. White pages highlight action (the girl’s crayon whips up a boat, a hot air balloon and a magic carpet when needed), but most spreads deliver fantastically intricate pen, ink and watercolor architectural illustrations that remain playfully engrossing. They conjure contextual questions with no clear answers, or perhaps with so many answers one’s imagination finds itself opening door upon door and crossing thresholds, just as the girl did to escape loneliness. After freeing the bird, she needs its help for a quick escape through a small purple door back to her everyday street and back to a boy who wields an equally powerful purple crayon (an obvious and moving homage).
An imaginative adventure story whose elaborate illustrations inspire wonder, careful examination and multiple reads. (Picture book. 2-6)Pub Date: Aug. 6, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-7636-6053-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 7, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2013
Too cute to be spooky indeed but most certainly sweet.
A ghost longs to be scary, but none of the creepy personas she tries on fit.
Misty, a feline ghost with big green eyes and long whiskers, wants to be the frightening presence that her haunted house calls for, but sadly, she’s “too cute to be spooky.” She dons toilet paper to resemble a mummy, attempts to fly on a broom like a witch, and howls at the moon like a werewolf. Nothing works. She heads to a Halloween party dressed reluctantly as herself. When she arrives, her friends’ joyful screams reassure her that she’s great just as she is. Sadler’s message, though a familiar one, is delivered effectively in a charming, ghostly package. Misty truly is too precious to be frightening. Laberis depicts an endearingly spooky, all-animal cast—a frog witch, for instance, and a crocodilian mummy. Misty’s sidekick, a cheery little bat who lends support throughout, might be even more adorable than she is. Though Misty’s haunted house is filled with cobwebs and surrounded by jagged, leafless trees, the charming characters keep things from ever getting too frightening. The images will encourage lingering looks. Clearly, there’s plenty that makes Misty special just as she is—a takeaway that adults sharing the book with their little ones should be sure to drive home.
Too cute to be spooky indeed but most certainly sweet. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2024
ISBN: 9780593702901
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The visual details invite interaction, making it a good choice for storytime or solo inspection.
It’s a quiet day, until….
“I have a bot!” An excited child’s happiness is short-lived, for the remote-controlled toy escapes its wireless tether and begins an ascent up the side of a skyscraper. The building’s doorman launches a race to recover the bot, and soon everyone wants to help. Attempts to retrieve the bot, which is rendered as a red rectangle with a propeller, arms, and a rudimentary face, go from the mundanity of a broom to the absurd—a bright orange beehive hairdo and a person-sized Venus’ flytrap are just some of the silly implements the building’s occupants use to try to rein in the bot. Each double-page spread reveals another level of the building—and further visual hijinks—as the bot makes its way to the top, where an unexpected hero waits (keep an eye out for falling bananas). The tall, narrow trim size echoes the shape of the skyscraper, providing a sense of height as the bot rises. Text is minimal; short declarations in tidy black dialogue bubbles with white courier-style typeface leave the primary-colored, blocky art to effectively carry the story. Facial expressions—both human and bot—are comically spot-on. The bot-owning child has light skin, and there are several people of color among those trying to rescue the bot. One person wears a kufi.
The visual details invite interaction, making it a good choice for storytime or solo inspection. (Picture book. 2-6)Pub Date: July 23, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-425-28881-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: March 30, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2019
PERSPECTIVES
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