If “being mean…means… // I LOVE YOU!!!” then this kid sure must love her mother. Wouldn’t lots of moms prefer a hug?
A monster enumerates all the ways her mother is mean.
While this blue-skinned child is completely serious in her criticisms of her green-skinned mother, hopefully readers will see similarities to their own moms: Mom wakes the narrator with tickles and coffee breath, waves goodbye at school dropoff, bribes her for conversation, and makes her read books at bedtime (four, not the desired 82). Weirdly, a school-picture-day thread is dropped abruptly in favor of a spelling bee (where Mom cheers). The creators of the podcast #IMOMSOHARD may have their tongues firmly in cheeks, but their child protagonist comes off as an entitled monster. Some adults may find the situations familiar, but few will want this parent-child duo as role models: The child is sassy (“Look, lady, my hands are all busy!”), and the mom is sometimes a doormat (making three breakfasts). Some of the rhymes are rough, and the meter sometimes stumbles. Briggs’ digital illustrations play up the humor in the text while smoothing the rougher edges a bit with a monster cast. Few characters have lifelike skin tones, and all have features that set them apart—varying numbers of appendages or eyes; horns, spines. The girl and her mother share blue hair, horns, and spotted skin; each has two legs and eyes, and the girl has two arms to her mother’s four. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at 15% of actual size.)
If “being mean…means… // I LOVE YOU!!!” then this kid sure must love her mother. Wouldn’t lots of moms prefer a hug? (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: March 23, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-304055-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
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
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among
Pete, the cat who couldn’t care less, celebrates Christmas with his inimitable lassitude.
If it weren’t part of the title and repeated on every other page, readers unfamiliar with Pete’s shtick might have a hard time arriving at “groovy” to describe his Christmas celebration, as the expressionless cat displays not a hint of groove in Dean’s now-trademark illustrations. Nor does Pete have a great sense of scansion: “On the first day of Christmas, / Pete gave to me… / A road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” The cat is shown at the wheel of a yellow microbus strung with garland and lights and with a star-topped tree tied to its roof. On the second day of Christmas Pete gives “me” (here depicted as a gray squirrel who gets on the bus) “2 fuzzy gloves, and a road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” On the third day, he gives “me” (now a white cat who joins Pete and the squirrel) “3 yummy cupcakes,” etc. The “me” mentioned in the lyrics changes from day to day and gift to gift, with “4 far-out surfboards” (a frog), “5 onion rings” (crocodile), and “6 skateboards rolling” (a yellow bird that shares its skateboards with the white cat, the squirrel, the frog, and the crocodile while Pete drives on). Gifts and animals pile on until the microbus finally arrives at the seaside and readers are told yet again that it’s all “GROOVY!”
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among . (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-267527-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
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