Fine amusement, elegant illustrations and a decent-enough story—and readers can play on as independent pilots to their...
A thoroughly enjoyable, hands-on aviation app twined with a story of the little plane that could, from Disney.
Dusty is a lowly crop-duster, but he has big plans: entering the Wings Around the Globe Race and showing the world just what a crop-duster can do. When he starts showing his stuff, other planes—especially Skipper, the old warplane, who has a surprise story of his own—come to his aid when needed. This is often, since there are thugs and betrayers out there wishing Dusty nothing but a crash landing. The story has its moments—lots of camaraderie and the glories of resolve—but two non-narrative elements really give this app its varoom. The first is the artwork, which emphasizes the fairy-tale quality of the story while coaxing a distinctly exotic feel from such locales as China, India, Mexico and an aircraft carrier. Even cooler, readers pilot the planes by tilting the iPad this way and that to fly through circles and collect fuel, with the ability to choose different levels of difficulty and different planes to fly. Plus, there are 6 languages to select from, so readers can brush up on their French as they try to get Dusty through an ice storm or a Swiss tunnel.
Fine amusement, elegant illustrations and a decent-enough story—and readers can play on as independent pilots to their hearts’ content. (iPad movie tie-in app. 6-10)Pub Date: July 11, 2013
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Disney Publishing Worldwide Applications
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2013
More trampling in the vineyards of the Literary Classics section, with results that will tickle fancies high and low.
Recasting Dog Man and his feline ward, Li’l Petey, as costumed superheroes, Pilkey looks East of Eden in this follow-up to Tale of Two Kitties (2017).
The Steinbeck novel’s Cain/Abel motif gets some play here, as Petey, “world’s evilest cat” and cloned Li’l Petey’s original, tries assiduously to tempt his angelic counterpart over to the dark side only to be met, ultimately at least, by Li’l Petey’s “Thou mayest.” (There are also occasional direct quotes from the novel.) But inner struggles between good and evil assume distinctly subordinate roles to riotous outer ones, as Petey repurposes robots built for a movie about the exploits of Dog Man—“the thinking man’s Rin Tin Tin”—while leading a general rush to the studio’s costume department for appropriate good guy/bad guy outfits in preparation for the climactic battle. During said battle and along the way Pilkey tucks in multiple Flip-O-Rama inserts as well as general gags. He lists no fewer than nine ways to ask “who cut the cheese?” and includes both punny chapter titles (“The Bark Knight Rises”) and nods to Hamiltonand Mary Poppins. The cartoon art, neatly and brightly colored by Garibaldi, is both as easy to read as the snappy dialogue and properly endowed with outsized sound effects, figures displaying a range of skin colors, and glimpses of underwear (even on robots).
More trampling in the vineyards of the Literary Classics section, with results that will tickle fancies high and low. (drawing instructions) (Graphic fantasy. 7-10)Pub Date: Dec. 26, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-545-93518-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Graphix/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2018
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
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