MIRANDA THE EXPLORER

A sudden gust of wind sends young Miranda and the balloon she’s aboard on a quick trip around the world. Some gust: making artful use of sandbags and vents to land and take off again, she comes down for visits with young folk in Moscow, Agra, Japan, Australia, New York, Egypt, Pisa, and Barcelona, before returning to London. Framed in cartoon panels of various sizes, each stop features recognizable landmarks, plus the occasional dialogue balloon or identifying caption. Though the people she meets sometimes greet her or bid farewell in a native language, everyone along the rather Eurocentric itinerary speaks English. Younger children may get some feeling for the human world’s diversity from this tour, but along with being disappointed to see more destinations marked on the endpaper maps than Miranda actually reaches, they may find it rather perfunctory next to Barnabas Kindersley’s Children Just Like Me (1995) or even Manya Stojic’s Hello World (2002). (Picture book. 6-8)