bookshelf

SOON, YOUR HANDS

Name: SOON, YOUR HANDS
Author: Jonathan Stutzman
ISBN: 978-0-593-42707-1

by Jonathan Stutzman ; illustrated by Elizabeth Lilly ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 28, 2023

Beautifully tender and thoughtful.

bookshelf

As children grow, they learn to use their hands to manipulate and create while their minds grasp ever more complex ideas.

A parent speaks directly to a child, telling them how their small hands fit perfectly in the larger adult hands.“ But soon, your hands will grow. And learn.” The child will be able to do things that are practical, messy, bold, and creative and find splendid new experiences in the wider world. Then the parent can let go. But, for now, those small hands still need the strength and encouragement of a loving parent. Stutzman’s poetic text is a sweet, warm, somewhat abstract testament to parents’ protective love, enhanced by Lilly’s loose, quirky pen, ink, and watercolor illustrations, which provide needed, concrete expressions of the theme. They depict three diverse families, neighbors in three attached row houses. Two Black adults, of different skin tones, head one family with a Black child. A brown-skinned couple parent a child who wears hearing aids; the family is cued as Latine. A light-skinned working parent and older adult (perhaps a grandparent) care for a light-skinned child. A page of framed, labeled photos of the children as adults appears toward the end—the narrator’s hopeful predictions for their futures. Sharp-eyed readers will notice carefully crafted details in the vignettes that depict each family’s unique qualities and what they share—namely, their love and closeness. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

Beautifully tender and thoughtful. (American Sign Language glossary) (Picture book. 4-9)

Pub Date: March 28, 2023

ISBN: 978-0-593-42707-1

Page Count: 48

Publisher: Knopf

Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

- BOOK REVIEW
FITZ AND CLEO PUT A PARTY ON IT
by Jonathan Stutzman ; illustrated by Heather Fox

- BOOK REVIEW
TINY T. REX AND THE GRAND TA-DA!
by Jonathan Stutzman ; illustrated by Jay Fleck

- BOOK REVIEW
THE MOUSE WHO CARRIED A HOUSE ON HIS BACK
by Jonathan Stutzman ; illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault

bookshelf

LITTLE DAYMOND LEARNS TO EARN

by Daymond John ; illustrated by Nicole Miles ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 21, 2023

It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists.

bookshelf

How to raise money for a coveted poster: put your friends to work!

John, founder of the FUBU fashion line and a Shark Tank venture capitalist, offers a self-referential blueprint for financial success. Having only half of the $10 he needs for a Minka J poster, Daymond forks over $1 to buy a plain T-shirt, paints a picture of the pop star on it, sells it for $5, and uses all of his cash to buy nine more shirts. Then he recruits three friends to decorate them with his design and help sell them for an unspecified amount (from a conveniently free and empty street-fair booth) until they’re gone. The enterprising entrepreneur reimburses himself for the shirts and splits the remaining proceeds, which leaves him with enough for that poster as well as a “brand-new business book,” while his friends express other fiscal strategies: saving their share, spending it all on new art supplies, or donating part and buying a (math) book with the rest. (In a closing summation, the author also suggests investing in stocks, bonds, or cryptocurrency.) Though Miles cranks up the visual energy in her sparsely detailed illustrations by incorporating bright colors and lots of greenbacks, the actual advice feels a bit vague. Daymond is Black; most of the cast are people of color. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists. (Picture book. 7-9)

Pub Date: March 21, 2023

ISBN: 978-0-593-56727-2

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

bookshelf

ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

bookshelf

Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)