A fun read, though perhaps not a favorite.
A “Snow White”–inspired tale of a kind, intelligent bot-builder, from the creators of Interstellar Cinderella (2015) and Reading Beauty (2019).
“Once upon a planetoid,” Jo Bright, a green-haired, tan-skinned girl clad in overalls, builds bots from found items, improvising with odds and ends because the “jealous, robot-building queen” (depicted with light skin) won’t let her use her tools and supplies. When the queen’s mirror-bot announces that Jo Bright is the best bot-builder, the queen banishes Jo, leaving her near the dragon’s lair. Sparky, the misunderstood and lonely dragon, invites Jo in for tea, and Jo uses items in the dragon’s home to make seven bots to keep the creature company. Back at the castle, the mirror-bot still confirms Jo is the best bot-builder, so the queen attempts to kill Jo with an evil apple-bot, which zaps the smallest dragon-bot instead. To repair him, Jo must sneak into the queen’s workshop. Sparky and the bots go with her, prepared for trouble, and together they defeat the queen. Underwood’s narrative moves quickly in rhyming stanzas, with only occasionally unnatural constructions to serve the rhyme. Hunt’s quirky illustrations offer diverse creatures, colorful landscapes, and whimsical looking bots, though images of the queen smashing the mirror-bot and the little bot crumpled on the ground may unsettle younger readers, especially those not familiar with the original story. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A fun read, though perhaps not a favorite. (Fairy tale. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 20, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-4521-7130-2
Page Count: 44
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2022
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
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts.
Can knightly deeds bring together a feathered odd couple who are on opposite daily schedules?
Having won over a dragon (and millions of fans) in the Caldecott Honor–winning Knight Owl (2022), the fierce yet impossibly cute nocturnal, armor-clad owlet faces a new challenge—sleep deprivation—in the wake of taking on Early Bird, a trainee who rises with the sun and chatters interminably: “I made pancakes! Do you like pancakes? I love pancakes! Where’s the syrup?” It’s enough to test the patience of even the knightliest of owls, and eventually Knight Owl explodes in anger. But although Early Bird is even smaller than her mentor, she turns out to be just as determined to achieve knighthood. After he tells her to leave, she acquits herself so nobly in a climactic encounter with a pack of wolves that she earns a place at the castle. Denise proves a dab hand at depicting genuinely slinky, scary wolves as well as slipping cheerfully anachronistic newspapers and other sight gags into his realistically wrought medieval settings to underscore the tale’s tongue-in-cheek tone. Better yet, a final view of the doughty duo sitting down together to a lavish pancake breakfast/dinner at dusk ends the episode in a sweet rush of syrup and bonhomie.
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9780316564526
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
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