A pro-clown missive that fails to entertain.
A boy decides to follow in his father’s comically large footsteps.
The unnamed white Jewish protagonist clearly doesn’t want to go to his friends’ parties. Mom forces him to, but the visiting entertainment at each of them, a classic red-nosed, white-faced, huge-pantsed clown who makes balloon animals, leaves him cold. When Happy the Clown asks him, “And what kind of animal do you want, young man?” he answers, “That’s okay, Dad.…I’ll pass.” The boy confesses to a friend that he doesn’t like clowns and wishes his father had a “regular” job, like being an accountant, but when the clowning business goes down and Dad goes back to being a lawyer, the boy starts to realize what he’s missing. This small-trim picture book has long blocks of text on most spreads, narrowing its read-aloud audience to patient lapsitters. But absence of controlled vocabulary keeps it off the early-reader shelf, nor is it an early chapter book. Some similarly uncategorizable stories can be made to work, but unfortunately this one suffers from an emotionally flat story with little to no tension or intrigue to keep readers of any level engaged. The loose gray and colored-pencil illustrations tonally match the story but don’t add excitement or depth to the pages.
(This book releases first as a digital edition, with print release currently scheduled for Aug. 4, 2020.)
A pro-clown missive that fails to entertain. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: May 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-77306-178-8
Page Count: 44
Publisher: Groundwood
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A brisk if bland offering for series fans, but cleverer metafictive romps abound.
The titular cookie runs off the page at a bookstore storytime, pursued by young listeners and literary characters.
Following on 13 previous How To Catch… escapades, Wallace supplies sometimes-tortured doggerel and Elkerton, a set of helter-skelter cartoon scenes. Here the insouciant narrator scampers through aisles, avoiding a series of elaborate snares set by the racially diverse young storytime audience with help from some classic figures: “Alice and her mad-hat friends, / as a gift for my unbirthday, / helped guide me through the walls of shelves— / now I’m bound to find my way.” The literary helpers don’t look like their conventional or Disney counterparts in the illustrations, but all are clearly identified by at least a broad hint or visual cue, like the unnamed “wizard” who swoops in on a broom to knock over a tower labeled “Frogwarts.” Along with playing a bit fast and loose with details (“Perhaps the boy with the magic beans / saved me with his cow…”) the author discards his original’s lip-smacking climax to have the errant snack circling back at last to his book for a comfier sort of happily-ever-after.
A brisk if bland offering for series fans, but cleverer metafictive romps abound. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7282-0935-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A fair choice, but it may need some support to really blast off.
This rocket hopes to take its readers on a birthday blast—but there may or may not be enough fuel.
Once a year, a one-seat rocket shoots out from Earth. Why? To reveal a special congratulatory banner for a once-a-year event. The second-person narration puts readers in the pilot’s seat and, through a (mostly) ballad-stanza rhyme scheme (abcb), sends them on a journey toward the sun, past meteors, and into the Kuiper belt. The final pages include additional information on how birthdays are measured against the Earth’s rotations around the sun. Collingridge aims for the stars with this title, and he mostly succeeds. The rhyme scheme flows smoothly, which will make listeners happy, but the illustrations (possibly a combination of paint with digital enhancements) may leave the viewers feeling a little cold. The pilot is seen only with a 1960s-style fishbowl helmet that completely obscures the face, gender, and race by reflecting the interior of the rocket ship. This may allow readers/listeners to picture themselves in the role, but it also may divest them of any emotional connection to the story. The last pages—the backside of a triple-gatefold spread—label the planets and include Pluto. While Pluto is correctly labeled as a dwarf planet, it’s an unusual choice to include it but not the other dwarfs: Ceres, Eris, etc. The illustration also neglects to include the asteroid belt or any of the solar system’s moons.
A fair choice, but it may need some support to really blast off. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: July 31, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-338-18949-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: David Fickling/Phoenix/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
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