Flamboyantly fanciful and so much fun!
Matt Katz is the owner of Kat Hats Incorporated, a training facility where a cat can be “patiently taught to arrange itself on the head of a person as a living headpiece.”
When Thirdbeard’s elderly mother, Chickarina, goes missing on a snowy evening, he enlists the help of Matt Katz. Thirdbeard fears that his Mommy, who happens to be a nice, harmless witch, will suffer from brain freeze since she was last seen eating “an extra-large jumbo frozen fruitsicle, blueberry and avocado flavor,” and walking hatless up a steep mountain known as Witch's Spitz. Luckily, Matt's beloved and most successful kat hat, Thermal Herman 6⅞ths, has only just returned from a trip to Nepal. With one look from Matt, Thermal Herman 6⅞ths rushes out into the falling night. Aided by a madcap motorcyclist and a random moose who is “using his antlers as a hat rack” for some unspecified reason, the plucky cat saves Chickarina and brings her home, warmly hatted. This zany picture book is delightfully replete with straight-faced nonsense and atypical characters, many of whom have green skin and long, pointy noses. White, androgynous Matt wears colorful, mismatched socks and is husband to the always-fly, brown-skinned Glamorella, whose clothing and hairstyle change in every scene. Their son, Pocketmouse, is an aspiring magician who happens to use a wheelchair, and their daughter, Lambkin, wears a jester’s costume and is forever performing circus tricks. The bright and busy gouache illustrations are chock-full of offbeat, whimsical details that tell parallel stories of their own. (This review has been updated for factual accuracy.)
Flamboyantly fanciful and so much fun! (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-4197-5194-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: Dec. 2, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2021
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A stocking stuffer par excellence, just right for dishing up with milk and cookies.
Pigeon finds something better to drive than some old bus.
This time it’s Santa delivering the fateful titular words, and with a “Ho. Ho. Whoa!” the badgering begins: “C’mon! Where’s your holiday spirit? It would be a Christmas MIRACLE! Don’t you want to be part of a Christmas miracle…?” Pigeon is determined: “I can do Santa stuff!” Like wrapping gifts (though the accompanying illustration shows a rather untidy present), delivering them (the image of Pigeon attempting to get an oversize sack down a chimney will have little ones giggling), and eating plenty of cookies. Alas, as Willems’ legion of young fans will gleefully predict, not even Pigeon’s by-now well-honed persuasive powers (“I CAN BE JOLLY!”) will budge the sleigh’s large and stinky reindeer guardian. “BAH. Also humbug.” In the typically minimalist art, the frustrated feathered one sports a floppily expressive green and red elf hat for this seasonal addition to the series—but then discards it at the end for, uh oh, a pair of bunny ears. What could Pigeon have in mind now? “Egg delivery, anyone?”
A stocking stuffer par excellence, just right for dishing up with milk and cookies. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Sept. 5, 2023
ISBN: 9781454952770
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Union Square Kids
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2023
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among
Pete, the cat who couldn’t care less, celebrates Christmas with his inimitable lassitude.
If it weren’t part of the title and repeated on every other page, readers unfamiliar with Pete’s shtick might have a hard time arriving at “groovy” to describe his Christmas celebration, as the expressionless cat displays not a hint of groove in Dean’s now-trademark illustrations. Nor does Pete have a great sense of scansion: “On the first day of Christmas, / Pete gave to me… / A road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” The cat is shown at the wheel of a yellow microbus strung with garland and lights and with a star-topped tree tied to its roof. On the second day of Christmas Pete gives “me” (here depicted as a gray squirrel who gets on the bus) “2 fuzzy gloves, and a road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” On the third day, he gives “me” (now a white cat who joins Pete and the squirrel) “3 yummy cupcakes,” etc. The “me” mentioned in the lyrics changes from day to day and gift to gift, with “4 far-out surfboards” (a frog), “5 onion rings” (crocodile), and “6 skateboards rolling” (a yellow bird that shares its skateboards with the white cat, the squirrel, the frog, and the crocodile while Pete drives on). Gifts and animals pile on until the microbus finally arrives at the seaside and readers are told yet again that it’s all “GROOVY!”
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among . (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-267527-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
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BOOK REVIEW
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