A barking good time will be had by all.
Who doesn’t love a good “furry tail”?
This book opens as expected: Cinderella sweeps the fireplace and bemoans her sad, lonely, boring existence. Then her wish for a fairy godmother is fulfilled in the form of a fairy dogmother, who’s crestfallen when Cinderella explains whom she actually wanted. However, Cinderella, an empathetic dog lover, decides to give this a go. Alas, a misunderstanding occurs when Cinderella asks about preparing for the “ball.” The Fairy Dogmother interprets the word differently at first, envisioning a frolicsome game of fetch. However, she’s got magic up her sleeve and whips up a nifty outfit, footwear, and hairstyle for Cinderella, albeit with a canine aspect. Other “Cinderella” details get “doggified,” and the ball ends up being a howl in more ways than one. Spoiler alert: There’s a twist on the glass-slipper-leading-to-marriage ending. Not to worry. This one’s much better—and involves squirrels. This rollicking story will arouse plenty of giggles as young readers enumerate the ways in which it veers from the original. Adults can encourage little ones to think of how “Cinderella” might work with other animals subbing in for the fairy godmother. The imaginative, colorful digital illustrations burst with energy and expressiveness. Cinderella is light-skinned. The royal family hosting the ball is brown-skinned, and background characters are racially diverse; the brown, floppy-eared, tutu-wearing dogmother is adorably memorable. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A barking good time will be had by all. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-984813-82-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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