An important story about how marginalized groups can work together for social justice, but some elements feel ill-conceived.
When a Black man is “hurt” by police and Black Lives Matter protests are staged in her community, 7-year-old Hmong protagonist Mai knows that “today is different.”
Then Mai’s Black best friend, Kiara, misses school; the two girls usually do everything together…“but not today.” Seeking to understand more about race, Mai questions her teenage brother, Tou, and learns that “in the Hmong culture, there are Black Hmong, White Hmong, Green Hmong, Striped Hmong, and many more.” Although their parents want to shield them from the unfolding events—“It doesn’t have anything to do with you”—the siblings make a protest sign, and Mai uses colored pencils as an object lesson to show her parents that “if we all stand together, we will be unbreakable.” She and Tou run away to a Black Lives Matter rally to march in solidarity with Kiara’s family and are pleasantly surprised when Mom and Dad join them. The book focuses on racism against Black Americans, but Dad and Tou board up their house’s windows, a potentially confusing detail that the story glosses over. Though risking oversimplifying how children process racial trauma, Moua positively portrays a cross-cultural friendship and explores how racial violence impacts children. The backmatter explains the historical discrimination against Hmong people in many countries and emphasizes the importance of African American and Hmong communities uniting to fight injustice. Colorful but mediocre digital paint illustrations add little to the telling but realistically portray urban diversity.
An important story about how marginalized groups can work together for social justice, but some elements feel ill-conceived. (author’s note, pronunciation guide, glossary) (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: April 5, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-72843-029-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Carolrhoda
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2022
This bunny escapes all the traps but fails to find a logical plot or an emotional connection with readers.
The bestselling series (How to Catch an Elf, 2016, etc.) about capturing mythical creatures continues with a story about various ways to catch the Easter Bunny as it makes its annual deliveries.
The bunny narrates its own story in rhyming text, beginning with an introduction at its office in a manufacturing facility that creates Easter eggs and candy. The rabbit then abruptly takes off on its delivery route with a tiny basket of eggs strapped to its back, immediately encountering a trap with carrots and a box propped up with a stick. The narrative focuses on how the Easter Bunny avoids increasingly complex traps set up to catch him with no explanation as to who has set the traps or why. These traps include an underground tunnel, a fluorescent dance floor with a hidden pit of carrots, a robot bunny, pirates on an island, and a cannon that shoots candy fish, as well as some sort of locked, hazardous site with radiation danger. Readers of previous books in the series will understand the premise, but others will be confused by the rabbit’s frenetic escapades. Cartoon-style illustrations have a 1960s vibe, with a slightly scary, bow-tied bunny with chartreuse eyes and a glowing palette of neon shades that shout for attention.
This bunny escapes all the traps but fails to find a logical plot or an emotional connection with readers. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4926-3817-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
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)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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