Emphasizing collaboration and creativity, this lovely little board book is a wonderful wintertime selection for toddlers and...
A group of friends turns a snowball disaster into some spontaneous fun.
A sweet-looking little mouse with a red-and-white–striped scarf stands alone in a gently sloping wintry landscape with only a snowball formed by a small die-cut circle for company. The text reads, simply, “A snowball.” A cat carrying a backpack and cane soon arrives to help make it bigger. Next, a pig in a tuxedo and top hat is recruited to help push it. The three push the now-giant die-cut snowball over the top of a hill and right onto a little rabbit enjoying a carrot. Soon, everyone is plunging down the hill as the snowball gains momentum until it all comes to a screeching halt with a giant “SPLAT!” “Now what?” reads the text as the animal friends brush themselves off and stare at a big pile of snow littered with objects, including a scarf, hat, carrot, cane, and backpack. Inspired, the friends use the snow and the objects they all lost in the fall to fashion a snowman. The simple, clever plot is conveyed through sparse text, with the force of the story coming from the charming illustrations and the growing die-cut circle representing the snowball.
Emphasizing collaboration and creativity, this lovely little board book is a wonderful wintertime selection for toddlers and preschoolers. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-988-8240-42-5
Page Count: 16
Publisher: minedition
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2015
A pleasant holiday spent with a perfectly charming character.
One of Boynton's signature characters celebrates Halloween.
It's Halloween time, and Pookie the pig is delighted. Mom helps the little porker pick out the perfect Halloween costume, a process that spans the entire board book. Using an abcb rhyme scheme, Boynton dresses Pookie in a series of cheerful costumes, including a dragon, a bunny, and even a caped superhero. Pookie eventually settles on the holiday classic, a ghost, by way of a bedsheet. Boynton sprinkles in amusing asides to her stanzas as Pookie offers costume commentary ("It's itchy"; "It's hot"; "I feel silly"). Little readers will enjoy the notion of transforming themselves with their own Halloween costumes while reading this book, and a few parents may get some ideas as well. Boynton's clean, sharp illustrations are as good as ever. This is Pookie's first holiday title, but readers will surely welcome more.
A pleasant holiday spent with a perfectly charming character. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: July 7, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-553-51233-5
Page Count: 18
Publisher: Robin Corey/Random
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2016
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An excellent, rounded effort from a creator who knows how to deliver.
The farmyard's chickens experience Halloween.
A round, full moon shines in the sky, and the chickens of Boynton's barnyard are feeling “nervous.” Pumpkins shine “with flickering eyes,” witches and wizards wander the pastures, and one chicken has seen “a mouse of enormous size.” It’s Halloween night, and readers will delight as the chickens huddle together and try to figure out what's going on. All ends well, of course, and in Boynton's trademark silly style. (It’s really quite remarkable how her ranks of white, yellow-beaked chickens evoke rows of candy corn.) At this point parents and children know what they're in for when they pick up a book by the prolific author, and she doesn't disappoint here. The chickens are silly, the pigs are cute, and the coloring and illustrations evoke a warmth that little ones wary of Halloween will appreciate. For children leery of the ghouls and goblins lurking in the holiday's iconography, this is a perfect antidote, emphasizing all the fun Halloween has to offer.
An excellent, rounded effort from a creator who knows how to deliver. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Aug. 23, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-7611-9300-5
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Workman
Review Posted Online: Sept. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
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