Delightful rhyming combined with clever illustrations elevate a simple search for love.
To woo a mate, a male bowerbird gathers enticing objects to decorate his home.
Scruffy, bighearted Bert places a purple flower outside his new bower and awaits his bride. “Haughty” Nanette arrives, sniffs, and makes clear that a simple flower won’t be enough. Hurt, Bert flies off to gather more objects to improve his chances at love. A cumulative rhyme structure anchors his multiple attempts to please Nanette: “The snail shell, the silver bell, / The wrapper from the caramel, / Plus the pretty purple flower. / ‘Now will you come inside my bower?’” Fickle Nanette continues to reject Bert. Alas, a second male bird, Claude, arrives and tricks Bert, sending him on a doomed expedition to find a gold ring for Nanette. While Bert flies off, Claude steals his treasures and, ultimately, Nanette. Donaldson’s intricate rhymes, together with Rayner’s illustration of a dejected, slumping Bert, convey his heartbreak: “Where were the comb, the gnome, the foam, / The green pea, the strawberry.” Rayner’s mixed-media illustrations capture the eager-to-please Bert’s open nature, using an earthy palette that pops whenever the purple flower appears. Bert considers giving up on love, but the purple flower’s bold color still has some magic to work. He hears another bird approach: “She look[s] Bert over once or twice / And add[s], “You look very nice, / And what a pretty purple flower!” Could he, at long last, have found his mate?
Delightful rhyming combined with clever illustrations elevate a simple search for love. (brief information on bowerbird behavior) (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2024
ISBN: 9781915801845
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Boxer Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2024
A stocking stuffer par excellence, just right for dishing up with milk and cookies.
Pigeon finds something better to drive than some old bus.
This time it’s Santa delivering the fateful titular words, and with a “Ho. Ho. Whoa!” the badgering begins: “C’mon! Where’s your holiday spirit? It would be a Christmas MIRACLE! Don’t you want to be part of a Christmas miracle…?” Pigeon is determined: “I can do Santa stuff!” Like wrapping gifts (though the accompanying illustration shows a rather untidy present), delivering them (the image of Pigeon attempting to get an oversize sack down a chimney will have little ones giggling), and eating plenty of cookies. Alas, as Willems’ legion of young fans will gleefully predict, not even Pigeon’s by-now well-honed persuasive powers (“I CAN BE JOLLY!”) will budge the sleigh’s large and stinky reindeer guardian. “BAH. Also humbug.” In the typically minimalist art, the frustrated feathered one sports a floppily expressive green and red elf hat for this seasonal addition to the series—but then discards it at the end for, uh oh, a pair of bunny ears. What could Pigeon have in mind now? “Egg delivery, anyone?”
A stocking stuffer par excellence, just right for dishing up with milk and cookies. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Sept. 5, 2023
ISBN: 9781454952770
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Union Square Kids
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2023
Sadly, the storytelling runs aground.
A little red sleigh has big Christmas dreams.
Although the detailed, full-color art doesn’t anthropomorphize the protagonist (which readers will likely identify as a sled and not a sleigh), a close third-person text affords the object thoughts and feelings while assigning feminine pronouns. “She longed to become Santa’s big red sleigh,” reads an early line establishing the sleigh’s motivation to leave her Christmas-shop home for the North Pole. Other toys discourage her, but she perseveres despite creeping self-doubt. A train and truck help the sleigh along, and when she wishes she were big, fast, and powerful like them, they offer encouragement and counsel patience. When a storm descends after the sleigh strikes out on her own, an unnamed girl playing in the snow brings her to a group of children who all take turns riding the sleigh down a hill. When the girl brings her home, the sleigh is crestfallen she didn’t reach the North Pole. A convoluted happily-ever-after ending shows a note from Santa that thanks the sleigh for giving children joy and invites her to the North Pole next year. “At last she understood what she was meant to do. She would build her life up spreading joy, one child at a time.” Will she leave the girl’s house to be gifted to other children? Will she stay and somehow also reach ever more children? Readers will be left wondering. (This book was reviewed digitally with 11-by-18-inch double-page spreads viewed at 31.8% of actual size.)
Sadly, the storytelling runs aground. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-72822-355-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2020
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