Fantastical and only slightly frightful fun.
Letter skills, vocabulary, and fantasy—oh my!
This oversized board book should fire the imaginations of a wide range of young readers, whether they’re mastering the alphabet or old enough to be captivated by the lore of myths and legends. Brilliant colors, a textured cover, and vivid images of creatures and monsters will intrigue and amuse but are unlikely to inspire nightmares. The text is rhymed and usually rhythmic, although the Loch Ness Monster, “aka Nessie,” entry has an amusing overabundance of syllables. The book opens on a scene of an explorer’s den, with a presumably ancient volume depicting dragons and rocs on the desk along with a unicorn horn, jackalope antlers, and a chart of the world depicting giant sea creatures swimming in the oceans. “The world is full of many beasties and creatures,” begins the text, “with all manner and type of magical features. / If you’d like to know more about these beasts in your midst, / then continue on and read this mythical list.” Entries begin with “A is for Alien, who zips through the skies. / B is for Basilisk, don’t look at its eyes!” Kraken, Mermaid, Phoenix, Sphinx, Unicorn, Vampire, and Zombie also make the cut. If you were wondering: “X is for... Xylophone Cat? OK—we made that one up.” The last two pages are a glossary.
Fantastical and only slightly frightful fun. (Board book. 3-8)Pub Date: July 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-68052-925-8
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Cottage Door Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
A wandering effort, happy but pointless.
The perfect book for kids who love dragons and mild tacos.
Rubin’s story starts with an incantatory edge: “Hey, kid! Did you know that dragons love tacos? They love beef tacos and chicken tacos. They love really big gigantic tacos and tiny little baby tacos as well.” The playing field is set: dragons, tacos. As a pairing, they are fairly silly, and when the kicker comes in—that dragons hate spicy salsa, which ignites their inner fireworks—the silliness is sillier still. Second nature, after all, is for dragons to blow flames out their noses. So when the kid throws a taco party for the dragons, it seems a weak device that the clearly labeled “totally mild” salsa comes with spicy jalapenos in the fine print, prompting the dragons to burn down the house, resulting in a barn-raising at which more tacos are served. Harmless, but if there is a parable hidden in the dragon-taco tale, it is hidden in the unlit deep, and as a measure of lunacy, bridled or unbridled, it doesn’t make the leap into the outer reaches of imagination. Salmieri’s artwork is fitting, with a crabbed, ethereal line work reminiscent of Peter Sís, but the story does not offer it enough range.
A wandering effort, happy but pointless. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: June 14, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-8037-3680-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: March 27, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
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
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