Creating thick-lined color woodcuts even simpler than the Caldecott-winning art of My Friend Rabbit (2002), Rohmann follows an unusual lad—or part of him, anyway—on an adventure-filled odyssey. Young Otho is normal enough, except that he was born with a pumpkin for a head. One day while out playing, his noggin is snatched away by a bat, who eventually drops it into the ocean, where it’s swallowed, then spit up, by a fish, netted by a fisherman, and purchased at last by Otho’s mother. She reattaches it to his body (which had been kept safe “in a cool, dry place”), and gently warns him to be more careful in the future, for “you know the world will always be more difficult for a boy with a pumpkin for a head.” Maybe Otho could get some pointers from Arthur Yorinks’s It Happened in Pinsk (1983). Decidedly offbeat, but Rohmann is plainly having as much fun as readers will as they watch Otho’s expression change as he rolls helplessly from one hazard to the next. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Aug. 12, 2003
ISBN: 0-375-82416-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2003
Trickling, bubbling, swirling, rushing, a river flows down from its mountain beginnings, past peaceful country and bustling city on its way to the sea. Hooper (The Drop in My Drink, 1998, etc.) artfully evokes the water’s changing character as it transforms from “milky-cold / rattling-bold” to a wide, slow “sliding past mudflats / looping through marshes” to the end of its journey. Willey, best known for illustrating Geraldine McCaughrean’s spectacular folk-tale collections, contributes finely detailed scenes crafted in shimmering, intricate blues and greens, capturing mountain’s chill, the bucolic serenity of passing pastures, and a sense of mystery in the water’s shadowy depths. Though Hooper refers to “the cans and cartons / and bits of old wood” being swept along, there’s no direct conservation agenda here (for that, see Debby Atwell’s River, 1999), just appreciation for the river’s beauty and being. (Picture book/nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: June 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0792-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2000
Nolen and Nelson offer a smaller, but no less gifted counterpart to Big Jabe (2000) in this new tall tale. Shortly after being born one stormy night, Rose thanks her parents, picks a name, and gathers lightning into a ball—all of which is only a harbinger of feats to come. Decked out in full cowboy gear and oozing self-confidence from every pore, Rose cuts a diminutive, but heroic figure in Nelson’s big, broad Western scenes. Though she carries a twisted iron rod as dark as her skin and ropes clouds with fencing wire, Rose overcomes her greatest challenge—a pair of rampaging twisters—not with strength, but with a lullaby her parents sang. After turning tornadoes into much-needed rain clouds, Rose rides away, “that mighty, mighty song pressing on the bull’s-eye that was set at the center of her heart.” Throughout, she shows a reflective bent that gives her more dimension than most tall-tale heroes: a doff of the Stetson to her and her creators. (author’s note) (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-15-216472-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Silver Whistle/Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2003
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