Nikki is fat. Her vibrant teacher is also fat. Campbell establishes immediately a causal link between fatness and overeating (both Nikki and her teacher furtively sneak food during class). At home, mom provides only fried foods, lying to their doctor about what they eat. When Mrs. Patterson turns up absent from school for an unspecified fat-related illness, Nikki asks mom’s permission to diet. The supposed happy ending presents Mrs. Patterson's return, thinner and suddenly healthy; Nikki joins her for exercise, and Mrs. Patterson advises Nikki to “eat a little less” and “not when you're sad or angry or bored.” The emotional eating ceases instantly. The text fosters common myths that all fat people necessarily overeat and are unhealthy, and that thinness is possible for everyone, achievable through carrot sticks and brisk walks. All kids—not just fat ones—deserve information about nutrition and exercise, and fat characters deserve to be more than stereotypes of sloth and greed. Bates’s beautifully composed watercolors deserve better than these misleading messages. (Picture book. 5-7)
Pub Date: May 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-399-24311-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Give this child’s-eye view of a day at the beach with an attentive father high marks for coziness: “When your ball blows across the sand and into the ocean and starts to drift away, your daddy could say, Didn’t I tell you not to play too close to the waves? But he doesn’t. He wades out into the cold water. And he brings your ball back to the beach and plays roll and catch with you.” Alley depicts a moppet and her relaxed-looking dad (to all appearances a single parent) in informally drawn beach and domestic settings: playing together, snuggling up on the sofa and finally hugging each other goodnight. The third-person voice is a bit distancing, but it makes the togetherness less treacly, and Dad’s mix of love and competence is less insulting, to parents and children both, than Douglas Wood’s What Dads Can’t Do (2000), illus by Doug Cushman. (Picture book. 5-7)
Pub Date: May 23, 2005
ISBN: 0-618-00361-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2005
A sweet iteration of the “Big Bad Wolf Mellows Out” theme. Here, an old wolf does some soul searching and then learns to like vegetable stew after a half-frozen lamb appears on his doorstep, falls asleep in his arms, then wakes to give him a kiss. “I can’t eat a lamb who needs me! I might get heartburn!” he concludes. Clad in striped leggings and a sleeveless pullover decorated with bands of evergreens, the wolf comes across as anything but dangerous, and the lamb looks like a human child in a fleecy overcoat. No dreams are likely to be disturbed by this book, but hardened members of the Oshkosh set might prefer the more credible predators and sense of threat in John Rocco’s Wolf! Wolf! (March 2007) or Delphine Perrot’s Big Bad Wolf and Me (2006). (Picture book. 5-7)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2007
ISBN: 978-1-58925-067-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tiger Tales
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2007
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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