Make space on the bookshelf for this engaging title.
Onomatopoeic words representing city sounds invite children to guess what they are.
A completely black double-page spread with the words “Did you hear that?” printed in white starts the book and sets the tone. There will be no visual cues here, just an array of onomatopoeic words that prompt guesses. Some are easy: “Honk,” “vroom,” “beep,” and “zoom” clearly lead to cars. But others, such as “hustle,” “bustle,” “march,” “talk,” “walk,” and “go,” will make them think a little more before they turn the page to learn that it’s a group of lively pedestrians. Grown-ups reading with young children can help the game—and have fun along the way—by reading expressively, aided by the printing of key words in colored type. While the pages with the clues present colorful words simply set against a plain white background, the pages with the answers offer an explosion of bright, vibrant, and stylized mixed-media images portraying a diverse cast of city dwellers. Companion volume Rumble, Rumble, Grumble, Grumble shares the same presentation and concept, but the sounds here are related to nature. Both books have plenty of vocabulary-building heft, adding value to the guessing game: “screeching,” “shrieking,” and “hissing,” to name a few. The pages are made of a tear-resistant substance, making these good choices to take toddlers from board books to picture books.
Make space on the bookshelf for this engaging title. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: March 3, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4867-1657-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Flowerpot Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 7, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Adults will do better skipping the book and talking with their children.
Social-equity themes are presented to children in ABC format.
Terms related to intersectional inequality, such as “class,” “gender,” “privilege,” “oppression,” “race,” and “sex,” as well as other topics important to social justice such as “feminism,” “human being,” “immigration,” “justice,” “kindness,” “multicultural,” “transgender,” “understanding,” and “value” are named and explained. There are 26 in all, one for each letter of the alphabet. Colorful two-page spreads with kid-friendly illustrations present each term. First the term is described: “Belief is when you are confident something exists even if you can’t see it. Lots of different beliefs fill the world, and no single belief is right for everyone.” On the facing page it concludes: “B is for BELIEF / Everyone has different beliefs.” It is hard to see who the intended audience for this little board book is. Babies and toddlers are busy learning the names for their body parts, familiar objects around them, and perhaps some basic feelings like happy, hungry, and sad; slightly older preschoolers will probably be bewildered by explanations such as: “A value is an expression of how to live a belief. A value can serve as a guide for how you behave around other human beings. / V is for VALUE / Live your beliefs out loud.”
Adults will do better skipping the book and talking with their children. (Board book. 4-6)Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-78603-742-8
Page Count: 52
Publisher: Frances Lincoln
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2019
Caregivers eager to expose their children to fine art have better choices than this.
From “Apple” to “Zebra,” an alphabet of images drawn from museum paintings.
In an exhibition that recalls similar, if less parochial, ABCs from the Metropolitan Museum of Art (My First ABC, 2009) and several other institutions, Hahn presents a Eurocentric selection of paintings or details to illustrate for each letter a common item or animal—all printed with reasonable clarity and captioned with identifying names, titles, and dates. She then proceeds to saddle each with an inane question (“What sounds do you think this cat is making?” “Where can you find ice?”) and a clumsily written couplet that unnecessarily repeats the artist’s name: “Flowers are plants that blossom and bloom. / Frédéric Bazille painted them filling up this room!” She also sometimes contradicts the visuals, claiming that the horses in a Franz Marc painting entitled “Two Horses, 1912” are ponies, apparently to populate the P page. Moreover, her “X” is an actual X-ray of a Jean-Honoré Fragonard, showing that the artist repainted his subject’s face…interesting but not quite in keeping with the familiar subjects chosen for the other letters.
Caregivers eager to expose their children to fine art have better choices than this. (Informational picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5107-4938-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sky Pony Press
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2019
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