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WHAT IF ONE DAY...

Name: WHAT IF ONE DAY...
Author: Bruce Handy
ISBN: 9781592703838

by Bruce Handy ; illustrated by Ashleigh Corrin ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 26, 2023

Readers will need to mind the gap between this book’s premise and what it actually delivers.

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Handy’s latest picture book explores what might happen should different parts of our world suddenly be erased.

“What if one day…all the birds flew away?” Or if “all the water disappeared?” How about if there were no plants or colors or people? This text gets readers thinking about aspects of our world that can easily be taken for granted. It offers some gentle consequences, like worms relaxing in birds’ absence, before pivoting to ask readers to imagine what might be missing one day “because it hadn’t been dreamt of yet.” The well-intended attempt at encouraging readers’ thoughtfulness is undermined by some oversights. Namely, for many readers, such as those who live in areas threatened by climate change and deforestation or without access to clean water, these are not what-if scenarios; they are current or looming realities that are dismissed each time Handy insists “but there is water” or “but there are birds.” The book’s conceit—calling upon children to use their imaginations to envision how the world might look—is promising, but instead of empowering readers to create meaning for themselves, the text gets more muddled the closer they look. Depicting racially diverse characters, Corrin’s full, vibrant spreads convey movement and stillness, humor and pensiveness, hitting just the right visual tones, but the writing doesn’t quite manage to live up to the artwork.

Readers will need to mind the gap between this book’s premise and what it actually delivers. (Picture book. 3-7)

Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023

ISBN: 9781592703838

Page Count: 80

Publisher: Enchanted Lion Books

Review Posted Online: Sept. 9, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2023

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS

- BOOK REVIEW
THERE WAS A SHADOW
by Bruce Handy ; illustrated by Lisk Feng

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THE BOOK FROM FAR AWAY
by Bruce Handy ; illustrated by Julie Benbassat

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THE HAPPINESS OF A DOG WITH A BALL IN ITS MOUTH
by Bruce Handy ; illustrated by Hyewon Yum

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CARPENTER'S HELPER

by Sybil Rosen ; illustrated by Camille Garoche ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 16, 2021

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.

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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

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)