Porte and Cannon previously collaborated on Tale of a Tadpole (1997); this time their focus is on a different sort of tiny creature: orange ants, who play an important role in an original tale set in ancient China. Ma Jiang is a little girl from a small village who lives with her parents, older brothers, and baby brother, Bao. Her father and brothers keep busy climbing trees to capture nests of orange ants, used by orange growers to keep pests away from the fruit. Jiang’s mother sells the ants in the market while Jiang cares for her baby brother. When her father and older brothers are called away to fight in a war (and work on the Great Wall), Jiang and her mother have no ants to sell, and they must struggle to survive on the small amount her mother can earn selling woven bags and baskets. Jiang and little Bao accidentally discover that all ants like honey, and Jiang devises a new way to trap the orange ants using honey and one of her mother’s woven bags, thus restoring her family’s finances. The family is reunited when her father and brothers return in time to celebrate the New Year’s festival with a traditional feast. Porte’s story is well-written and accurately researched (source notes appended), but Cannon’s expressive illustrations done in watercolor, gouache, and sepia ink take center stage. Teachers of kindergarten through third grade will find this an interesting story to integrate into thematic studies of ants, insects in general, or China. A fascinating story to read for the Chinese New Year, too, perhaps with a slice of orange for each young listener. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-531-30241-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Orchard
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2000
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This story covers the few days preceding the much-anticipated Midnight Zombie Walk, when Stink and company will take to the...
An all-zombie-all-the-time zombiefest, featuring a bunch of grade-school kids, including protagonist Stink and his happy comrades.
This story covers the few days preceding the much-anticipated Midnight Zombie Walk, when Stink and company will take to the streets in the time-honored stiff-armed, stiff-legged fashion. McDonald signals her intent on page one: “Stink and Webster were playing Attack of the Knitting Needle Zombies when Fred Zombie’s eye fell off and rolled across the floor.” The farce is as broad as the Atlantic, with enough spookiness just below the surface to provide the all-important shivers. Accompanied by Reynolds’ drawings—dozens of scene-setting gems with good, creepy living dead—McDonald shapes chapters around zombie motifs: making zombie costumes, eating zombie fare at school, reading zombie books each other to reach the one-million-minutes-of-reading challenge. When the zombie walk happens, it delivers solid zombie awfulness. McDonald’s feel-good tone is deeply encouraging for readers to get up and do this for themselves because it looks like so much darned fun, while the sub-message—that reading grows “strong hearts and minds,” as well as teeth and bones—is enough of a vital interest to the story line to be taken at face value.Pub Date: March 13, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-7636-5692-8
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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