Fun wordplay balances heavy-handed moralizing.
Mouse teaches a lesson to “the naughty bear who doesn’t share.”
While her “tummy roll[s] and rumble[s],” Mouse “scamper[s] down the hill” to forage and is lucky enough to find four delicious apples. Just as Mouse is about to take her first bite, the bear that attentive readers will have seen lurking in previous illustrations looms large. “ ‘Apples,’ boomed the bear, / ‘are my favorite tasty treat. / And I’ve been here all winter / without anything to eat.’ ” (Since apples generally ripen in summer and fall, Bear’s—or Stickley’s—sense of seasons seems grievously off.) When Mouse offers to share the apples, Bear refuses and instead threatens to eat Mouse. Instead of just yielding the apples, Mouse devises a clever plan to trick Bear, and a double-page spread divided into three horizontal panels illustrates Bear’s long journey home while Mouse is secretly getting “fat and happy” on the apples. An astonished, angry Bear soon discovers the trick, but when Mouse offers the last apple to him, Bear abruptly and unrealistically realizes how good it feels to share, and the two become friends. Alliteration (“red and rosy”; “green and gleaming”) and the potential for dramatic voices for Mouse and Bear make the book fun to read aloud, though the rhythm has a few rough spots. (This book was reviewed digitally with 11-by-19-inch double-page spreads viewed at 35.6 % of actual size.)
Fun wordplay balances heavy-handed moralizing. (map) (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-72841-580-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Andersen Press USA
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Safe to creep on by.
Carle’s famous caterpillar expresses its love.
In three sentences that stretch out over most of the book’s 32 pages, the (here, at least) not-so-ravenous larva first describes the object of its love, then describes how that loved one makes it feel before concluding, “That’s why… / I[heart]U.” There is little original in either visual or textual content, much of it mined from The Very Hungry Caterpillar. “You are… / …so sweet,” proclaims the caterpillar as it crawls through the hole it’s munched in a strawberry; “…the cherry on my cake,” it says as it perches on the familiar square of chocolate cake; “…the apple of my eye,” it announces as it emerges from an apple. Images familiar from other works join the smiling sun that shone down on the caterpillar as it delivers assurances that “you make… / …the sun shine brighter / …the stars sparkle,” and so on. The book is small, only 7 inches high and 5 ¾ inches across when closed—probably not coincidentally about the size of a greeting card. While generations of children have grown up with the ravenous caterpillar, this collection of Carle imagery and platitudinous sentiment has little of his classic’s charm. The melding of Carle’s caterpillar with Robert Indiana’s iconic LOVE on the book’s cover, alas, draws further attention to its derivative nature.
Safe to creep on by. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Dec. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-448-48932-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Whether spoken by a dinosaur or a human, this parental message clearly radiates “I’ve loved you from the start.”
The cover’s glowing golden stars are but a small hint of the parent-child love inside.
In this companion book to the creators’ I Love You, My Little Unicorn (2022), a world full of digitally created dinosaurs illustrated in eye-catching colors dominates the pages. From the start, it’s clear that dinosaur parents have the same hopes and dreams for their offspring that human parents do. Readers don’t have to be dinosaur fans to smile when the parent-and-child dinosaur pairs playfully interact and share loving glances. Take special note of the ankylosauruses, whose tails arc to form a heart beneath a sky filled with heart-shaped clouds. The text in verse shares words of unconditional parental love and support and wisdom (“please remember all these things / that I want you to know”), appropriate for humans and dinos alike. “Roar with all your might!” “Spread your wings and fly.” “Use your voice, and ask for help.” There’s even a caveat that some “days will be dark / and other shades of gray.” But “there’s always brightness up ahead.” While the loving sentiments in the storytelling are clear, words are sometimes inverted to make the rhyme work, and the verse doesn’t always follow a consistent meter, but prereading will let the story shine during quiet snuggle times.
Whether spoken by a dinosaur or a human, this parental message clearly radiates “I’ve loved you from the start.” (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Dec. 5, 2023
ISBN: 9781728268361
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2023
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