“OK, so I’m Uncle Blubbafink. Hello already. I hear you’re looking for a good story or two. Well, you came to the right place.” This assertion is highly debatable. Uncle Blubbafink, a balding, squatty individual with deeply purple skin and a black-and-white striped trunk instead of a nose, certainly has stories to tell, but they stop short of being “seriously ridiculous,” managing instead to be seriously unfunny. Graves (Pet Boy, p. 109, etc.) here attempts the sort of zany hijinks perfected by Scieszka and Smith but delivers a tedious round of busily and brightly illustrated stories about Abraham (“Honest Ham”) Sandwich and George Washing Machine and the mysteriously chopped-down ham trees; Smoky, the baby volcano who was raised by chickens; and Dave, the dragon who ate so many used-car parts his head turned into a station wagon. Clearly the reader is expected to delight in these flights of illogic, but there is so little underpinning to them that they exist in a referential vacuum and thus carry very little humor. The book designer also clearly takes the Scieszka/Smith collaborations as a model, allowing the typeface to change color, size, and font in rapid succession, swooping around the pictures with abandon. The illustrations themselves are competent, and some, such as the image of a grassy moon covered with munching cows, are mildly humorous. Make no mistake: the same kids who love Captain Underpants may well revel in Uncle Blubbafink. But it’s hard to imagine an adult able to bear reading it to them. (Picture book. 7-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-439-24083-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2001
Trickling, bubbling, swirling, rushing, a river flows down from its mountain beginnings, past peaceful country and bustling city on its way to the sea. Hooper (The Drop in My Drink, 1998, etc.) artfully evokes the water’s changing character as it transforms from “milky-cold / rattling-bold” to a wide, slow “sliding past mudflats / looping through marshes” to the end of its journey. Willey, best known for illustrating Geraldine McCaughrean’s spectacular folk-tale collections, contributes finely detailed scenes crafted in shimmering, intricate blues and greens, capturing mountain’s chill, the bucolic serenity of passing pastures, and a sense of mystery in the water’s shadowy depths. Though Hooper refers to “the cans and cartons / and bits of old wood” being swept along, there’s no direct conservation agenda here (for that, see Debby Atwell’s River, 1999), just appreciation for the river’s beauty and being. (Picture book/nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: June 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0792-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2000
Alert readers will find the implicit morals: know your audience, mostly, but also never underestimate the power of “rock”...
The theme of persistence (for better or worse) links four tales of magic, trickery, and near disasters.
Lachenmeyer freely borrows familiar folkloric elements, subjecting them to mildly comical twists. In the nearly wordless “Hip Hop Wish,” a frog inadvertently rubs a magic lamp and finds itself saddled with an importunate genie eager to shower it with inappropriate goods and riches. In the title tale, an increasingly annoyed music-hating witch transforms a persistent minstrel into a still-warbling cow, horse, sheep, goat, pig, duck, and rock in succession—then is horrified to catch herself humming a tune. Athesius the sorcerer outwits Warthius, a rival trying to steal his spells via a parrot, by casting silly ones in Ig-pay Atin-lay in the third episode, and in the finale, a painter’s repeated efforts to create a flattering portrait of an ogre king nearly get him thrown into a dungeon…until he suddenly understands what an ogre’s idea of “flattering” might be. The narratives, dialogue, and sound effects leave plenty of elbow room in Blocker’s big, brightly colored panels for the expressive animal and human(ish) figures—most of the latter being light skinned except for the golden genie, the blue ogre, and several people of color in the “Sorcerer’s New Pet.”
Alert readers will find the implicit morals: know your audience, mostly, but also never underestimate the power of “rock” music. (Graphic short stories. 8-10)Pub Date: June 18, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-59643-750-0
Page Count: 112
Publisher: First Second
Review Posted Online: April 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2019
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