As Maria shows, some things are worth fighting for.
Maria’s clothes always match the occasion as well as her accessories, but she’s about to “lose [her] matchy-matchy mind.”
The book’s beautiful, flowery cover foreshadows the world Maria lives in. In the living room Maria’s outfit blends in with the print of the comfy chair she’s sitting in. At school her laces, lunchbox, backpack, and even the barrettes holding back her black hair match. One comical two-page spread shows Maria’s flowery yellow underwear matching her dress. Maria’s problem here, though, is not the outfits: It’s her mom. “My mom picks out all of my clothes. She makes everyone…and everything match.” Maria longs to mix it up, and in her fight for the right to self-expression, she rebels, conceals, debates, and marches. Finally, Mom concedes, even wearing her own unmatchy outfit: “Polka dots and petunias!” By the end of the book, Maria exults that “this is me. Marvelous, unmatching, mix-it-up me!” McGill’s humorous illustrations mix patterns, textiles, and collage to great effect. Readers might want to pair this book with Marisol McDonald Doesn’t Match/Marisol McDonald no combina, by Monica Brown and illustrated by Sara Palacios (2011), for a look at another child who rejoices in her individuality. Maria and her mother have black hair and olive skin; her school friends have a variety of skin and hair colors.
As Maria shows, some things are worth fighting for. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-944903-72-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Cameron + Company
Review Posted Online: Aug. 25, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Emergent readers will like the humor in little Pip’s pointed requests, and more engaging adventures for Otto and Pip will be...
In his third beginning reader about Otto the robot, Milgrim (See Otto, 2002, etc.) introduces another new friend for Otto, a little mouse named Pip.
The simple plot involves a large balloon that Otto kindly shares with Pip after the mouse has a rather funny pointing attack. (Pip seems to be in that I-point-and-I-want-it phase common with one-year-olds.) The big purple balloon is large enough to carry Pip up and away over the clouds, until Pip runs into Zee the bee. (“Oops, there goes Pip.”) Otto flies a plane up to rescue Pip (“Hurry, Otto, Hurry”), but they crash (and splash) in front of some hippos with another big balloon, and the story ends as it begins, with a droll “See Pip point.” Milgrim again succeeds in the difficult challenge of creating a real, funny story with just a few simple words. His illustrations utilize lots of motion and basic geometric shapes with heavy black outlines, all against pastel backgrounds with text set in an extra-large typeface.
Emergent readers will like the humor in little Pip’s pointed requests, and more engaging adventures for Otto and Pip will be welcome additions to the limited selection of funny stories for children just beginning to read. (Easy reader. 5-7)Pub Date: March 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-689-85116-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2003
Very young gardeners will need more information, but for certain picky eaters, the suggested strategy just might work.
A young spinach hater becomes a spinach lover after she has to grow her own in a class garden.
Unable to trade away the seed packet she gets from her teacher for tomatoes, cukes or anything else more palatable, Sylvia reluctantly plants and nurtures a pot of the despised veggie then transplants it outside in early spring. By the end of school, only the plot’s lettuce, radishes and spinach are actually ready to eat (talk about a badly designed class project!)—and Sylvia, once she nerves herself to take a nibble, discovers that the stuff is “not bad.” She brings home an armful and enjoys it from then on in every dish: “And that was the summer Sylvia Spivens said yes to spinach.” Raff uses unlined brushwork to give her simple cartoon illustrations a pleasantly freehand, airy look, and though Pryor skips over the (literally, for spinach) gritty details in both the story and an afterword, she does cover gardening basics in a simple and encouraging way.
Very young gardeners will need more information, but for certain picky eaters, the suggested strategy just might work. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Nov. 6, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-9836615-1-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Readers to Eaters
Review Posted Online: Sept. 25, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2012
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