A gentle, effective presentation of an environmental disaster.
Angered by the death of a whale, beached on the ocean shore she loves, Isley finds a constructive response.
When Isley learns that the dead right whale had starved from filling its stomach with plastic trash instead of whale food, she is devastated. Her first reaction is believably childlike—a tantrum. She stomps, she kicks, she screams: “NO MORE PLASTIC.” But she channels her distress into action, refusing plastic in all its forms and encouraging her neighbors to do the same. Although they forget about the whale eventually, returning to old habits, Isley continues to pick up plastic trash on the beach. With the mountain she’s collected, she builds a full-sized whale sculpture, an unavoidable reminder that changes behaviors in her community. Like Isley with her construction, author/illustrator Fullerton has created her illustrations from “repurposed plastic, sand, and moss.” Among the best of the recent books about ocean plastic thanks to its positive approach and practical suggestions included at the end, this title would work well as a group read-aloud. The narrative is full of sounds: lapping wave sounds begin and end the story, but there are also sea gulls’ squawks, whales’ songs, and a quiet nighthawk’s call. The target audience will be slightly younger than that for Susan Hood’s The Last Straw (2021), which has more substantive backmatter. The setting is Prince Edward Island; the protagonist presents White.
A gentle, effective presentation of an environmental disaster. (author’s note) (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: May 18, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-77278-113-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Pajama Press
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts.
Can knightly deeds bring together a feathered odd couple who are on opposite daily schedules?
Having won over a dragon (and millions of fans) in the Caldecott Honor–winning Knight Owl (2022), the fierce yet impossibly cute nocturnal, armor-clad owlet faces a new challenge—sleep deprivation—in the wake of taking on Early Bird, a trainee who rises with the sun and chatters interminably: “I made pancakes! Do you like pancakes? I love pancakes! Where’s the syrup?” It’s enough to test the patience of even the knightliest of owls, and eventually Knight Owl explodes in anger. But although Early Bird is even smaller than her mentor, she turns out to be just as determined to achieve knighthood. After he tells her to leave, she acquits herself so nobly in a climactic encounter with a pack of wolves that she earns a place at the castle. Denise proves a dab hand at depicting genuinely slinky, scary wolves as well as slipping cheerfully anachronistic newspapers and other sight gags into his realistically wrought medieval settings to underscore the tale’s tongue-in-cheek tone. Better yet, a final view of the doughty duo sitting down together to a lavish pancake breakfast/dinner at dusk ends the episode in a sweet rush of syrup and bonhomie.
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9780316564526
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
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