A sweet celebration of a baby, full of Jewish tradition.
A Jewish family celebrates a baby with traditional symbols and rituals.
The whole family—even the cat—dotes on baby in this board book. Newman’s rhyming text includes Yiddish and Hebrew vocabulary and Jewish traditions: There’s kugel and challah, a mezuzah and a tzedakah box, and, of course, many blessings and much joy. Newman doesn’t spend time defining the various terms for non-Jewish readers, allowing Nakata’s softly textured illustrations to provide some context clues. While the text is certainly very sweet and scans well, the beautiful images are the stars. There are wonderful details: wallpaper adorned with chicks, Zayde’s tortoiseshell glasses, and, delightfully, the cat behaving typically by stuffing itself inside a paper bag. These details bring this family to life. The only point of confusion in the book is that at first, it seems as though the family (all white presenting) is readying the house for a brand-new baby—Bubbe is knitting booties and baking on the first page, for example—but this is no newborn. The baby is shown forward-facing in a baby carrier, sitting up on a lap at the table, and climbing playfully on Zayde. Overall, this book would make a wonderful gift for a Jewish family welcoming a new addition, as it certainly conveys the excitement and joy of having a little one in the house.
A sweet celebration of a baby, full of Jewish tradition. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5415-2214-5
Page Count: 12
Publisher: Kar-Ben
Review Posted Online: Aug. 25, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
Perfect for Valentine’s Day, but the syrupy sweetness will cloy after the holiday.
Animal parents declare their love for their offspring in alphabetical order.
Each page displays an enormous capital letter, one line of verse with the keyword capitalized, and a loving nonhuman parent gazing adoringly at their baby. “A is for Always. I always love you more. / B is for Butterfly kisses. It’s you that I adore.” While not named or labelled as such, the A is also for an alligator and its hatchling and B is for a butterfly and a butterfly child (not a caterpillar—biology is not the aim of this title) interacting in some way with the said letter. For E there are an elephant and a calf; U features a unicorn and foal; and X, keyed to the last letter of the animal’s name, corresponds to a fox and three pups. The final double-page spread shows all the featured creatures and their babies as the last line declares: “Baby, I love you from A to Z!” The verse is standard fare and appropriately sentimental. The art is cartoony-cute and populated by suitably loving critters on solid backgrounds. Hearts accent each scene, but the theme of the project is never in any doubt.
Perfect for Valentine’s Day, but the syrupy sweetness will cloy after the holiday. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-7282-2095-6
Page Count: 28
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Jan. 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Guess how much you’ll be reading this.
Parent and child share a day of small adventures and cozy snuggles.
That the two happen to be tortoises is totally beside the point. Die-cut holes and shaped edges turn nearly every page flip into a surprise. Following a parental “Good morning, Baby” to greet the youngling’s “Wake up, wake up, I want to play… / The sun is up, it’s a brand new day!” the two reptiles ramble off to munch on leaves, weather a sudden rain shower, discover a flock of butterflies, climb a hill, watch the moon rise, and, at last, weary little one perched on top, settle down to snooze again. The paper engineering is ingenious. Turning a seemingly arbitrarily shaped page with a special window framing a pink butterfly fills the spread with many jewel-toned insects; even though the tortoises never change position, the scene is completely transformed. Hegarty’s rhymed narrative features lots of tender sentiments—“Wherever you are, wherever you go, / Baby, I’ll always love you so”—while steering clear of any gender references. In Elliott’s peaceful, grassy settings the wanderers’ small smiles and shared glances likewise create a sense of loving intimacy. This is likely to become a victim of its own appeal, being as the paper stock is rather too flimsy to survive much contact with toddler hands. Still, a clear winner for sharing with audiences of one or dozens.
Guess how much you’ll be reading this. (Novelty. 18 mos.-3)Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7282-3509-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2021
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