Not among the best.
Poor Matthew is having the worst Christmas ever.
Well before the holiday season arrives, only Jasper the dog provides Matthew with any comfort when his parents announce in the springtime that the family is moving. When autumn rolls around, Matthew (whom stiff, undistinguished illustrations depict as resembling his dad and appearing white with light skin, red, straight hair, and blue eyes) still hasn’t adjusted. Readers learn that “at his new school, Matthew counted the hours until he could run home to Jasper. At church nothing felt right.” Little sister Lucy (who looks like their mother, with wavy dark hair, light-brown skin, and brown eyes), is happy in their new community, and their parents appear to be happy, too. Lucy’s joy is quite apparent when the minister announces plans for an outdoor Nativity, and she volunteers her doll, Gabriela, to “be baby Jesus.” Matthew is embarrassed by her exuberance, but those feelings shift to deep sadness and worry just before Christmas when Jasper disappears. The family makes fliers and calls around to shelters and veterinarian offices, to no avail. On Christmas Eve, Matthew’s “heart ached for Jasper, lost somewhere in that terribly silent night.” And then, in “a Christmas miracle,” Jasper appears in the living Nativity’s manger, a narrative contrivance that beggars belief and does not mitigate the one-note moodiness of the pages that have come before.
Not among the best. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-947888-09-8
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Flyaway Books
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
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)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back.
With such short arms, how can Tiny T. Rex give a sad friend a hug?
Fleck goes for cute in the simple, minimally detailed illustrations, drawing the diminutive theropod with a chubby turquoise body and little nubs for limbs under a massive, squared-off head. Impelled by the sight of stegosaurian buddy Pointy looking glum, little Tiny sets out to attempt the seemingly impossible, a comforting hug. Having made the rounds seeking advice—the dino’s pea-green dad recommends math; purple, New Age aunt offers cucumber juice (“That is disgusting”); red mom tells him that it’s OK not to be able to hug (“You are tiny, but your heart is big!”), and blue and yellow older sibs suggest practice—Tiny takes up the last as the most immediately useful notion. Unfortunately, the “tree” the little reptile tries to hug turns out to be a pterodactyl’s leg. “Now I am falling,” Tiny notes in the consistently self-referential narrative. “I should not have let go.” Fortunately, Tiny lands on Pointy’s head, and the proclamation that though Rexes’ hugs may be tiny, “I will do my very best because you are my very best friend” proves just the mood-lightening ticket. “Thank you, Tiny. That was the biggest hug ever.” Young audiences always find the “clueless grown-ups” trope a knee-slapper, the overall tone never turns preachy, and Tiny’s instinctive kindness definitely puts him at (gentle) odds with the dinky dino star of Bob Shea’s Dinosaur Vs. series.
Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: March 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4521-7033-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 11, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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