Serviceable.
An animal book focusing on big brothers offers reflection questions for older siblings to ponder.
A human big brother and his younger sibling, both presenting White, leaf through a book (readers will note it is the book they are holding) to learn about big brothers of other species. Several animals, including naked mole rats, hoary marmots, and beavers, are presented in successive double-page spreads. One to three sentences of information appear on verso, with one question for readers on recto. Some of the questions are open-ended, asking kids to consider how big brothers help younger siblings stay safe. Other queries are straightforward, asking about eating preferences and favorite games after sharing facts about the crow and kangaroo, respectively. While the title speaks to brothers, presumably older siblings of any gender would revel in answering. Illustrations present each animal family like paper dolls. The vibrantly colored animals have slightly anthropomorphic eyes and lie flat on the landscape of their natural environment. While this style doesn’t necessarily command attention, it presents images cleanly. The predictable rhythm and simple visuals are soothing and allow for focus on the discussion questions posed in each spread. Racial diversity is present in an ensemble spread of human sibling pairs. However, each one of these shares exact skin tone and hair texture between the two, homogenizing their seen identities.
Serviceable. (glossary, charts, facts) (Informational picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-64351-822-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Arbordale Publishing
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
A gleeful game for budding naturalists.
Artfully cropped animal portraits challenge viewers to guess which end they’re seeing.
In what will be a crowd-pleasing and inevitably raucous guessing game, a series of close-up stock photos invite children to call out one of the titular alternatives. A page turn reveals answers and basic facts about each creature backed up by more of the latter in a closing map and table. Some of the posers, like the tail of an okapi or the nose on a proboscis monkey, are easy enough to guess—but the moist nose on a star-nosed mole really does look like an anus, and the false “eyes” on the hind ends of a Cuyaba dwarf frog and a Promethea moth caterpillar will fool many. Better yet, Lavelle saves a kicker for the finale with a glimpse of a small parasitical pearlfish peeking out of a sea cucumber’s rear so that the answer is actually face and butt. “Animal identification can be tricky!” she concludes, noting that many of the features here function as defenses against attack: “In the animal world, sometimes your butt will save your face and your face just might save your butt!” (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A gleeful game for budding naturalists. (author’s note) (Informational picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: July 11, 2023
ISBN: 9781728271170
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks eXplore
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A well-meaning but lackluster tribute.
Readers bid farewell to a beloved canine character.
Momo is—or was—an adorable and very photogenic border collie owned by author Knapp. The many readers who loved him in the previous half-dozen books are in for a shock with this one. “Momo had died” is the stark reality—and there are no photographs of him here. Instead, Momo has been replaced by a flat cartoonish pastiche with strange, staring round white eyes, inserted into some of Knapp’s photography (which remains appealing, insofar as it can be discerned under the mixed media). Previous books contained few or no words. Unfortunately, virtuosity behind a lens does not guarantee mastery of verse. The art here is accompanied by words that sometimes rhyme but never find a workable or predictable rhythm (“We’d fetch and we’d catch, / we’d run and we’d jump. Every day we found new / games to play”). It’s a pity, because the subject—a pet’s death—is an important one to address with children. Of course, Momo isn’t gone; he can still be found “everywhere” in memories. But alas, he can be found here only in the crude depictions of the darling dog so well known from the earlier books.
A well-meaning but lackluster tribute. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781683693864
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Quirk Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
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