A warm and engaging tale.
There’s more than meets the eye to the cuddly stuffy nestled upon your bed.
Young Clark has always had an army of stuffed animals in his room. The fluffy creatures are his favorite toys, and Clark arranges them in a special formation every night before bed. Some of Clark’s classmates have begun to pick on him because of this, and his mother has begun to hint that maybe he’s too old for them. But Clark’s gut tells him that his stuffed friends are very important, and it soon turns out that Clark is right. A menacing monster in the form of an oily shadow stalks the night, and stuffed animals loved by children are what keep the monster at bay. When Clark’s mom banishes stuffed animals from the house, all that stands between the monster and Clark’s family is a Grandma-made sock animal, Foon. The author twists plenty of originality from the old kid-afraid-of-the-dark chestnut, and the tension between Clark and his mom is well drawn. Clark (presumably white, like his family) has a soft, indoor-kid vibe to him that is refreshing in a middle-grade landscape teeming with kids who overflow with attitude. Chapters written from Foon’s perspective bring a healthy dose of weirdness to the book, neatly developing a character that has been alive just a few hours but is determined to do what needs to be done.
A warm and engaging tale. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-368-03701-3
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: July 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2019
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often...
A successful juvenile by the beloved New Yorker writer portrays a farm episode with an imaginative twist that makes a poignant, humorous story of a pig, a spider and a little girl.
Young Fern Arable pleads for the life of runt piglet Wilbur and gets her father to sell him to a neighbor, Mr. Zuckerman. Daily, Fern visits the Zuckermans to sit and muse with Wilbur and with the clever pen spider Charlotte, who befriends him when he is lonely and downcast. At the news of Wilbur's forthcoming slaughter, campaigning Charlotte, to the astonishment of people for miles around, spins words in her web. "Some Pig" comes first. Then "Terrific"—then "Radiant". The last word, when Wilbur is about to win a show prize and Charlotte is about to die from building her egg sac, is "Humble". And as the wonderful Charlotte does die, the sadness is tempered by the promise of more spiders next spring.
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often informative as amusing, and the whole tenor of appealing wit and pathos will make fine entertainment for reading aloud, too.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1952
ISBN: 978-0-06-026385-0
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1952
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
Poignant and heartwarming.
Zephyrina the cat, the “Robin Hood of felines,” rescues discarded toys so they can have new lives.
Zephyrina brings toys back to the apartment she shares with Elizaveta and her daughter, Dasha, refugees from war-torn Ukraine. Dasha reconditions Zephyrina’s rescues and sets them outside for three days, just in case they have owners who want to reclaim them. Afterward, they join the other toys in the parlor—the Second Chances Home for the Tossed and Treasured. Dasha and Elizaveta don’t know that the toys are sentient. At midnight they abandon their rigid daytime postures to cavort and play, overseen by their leader, Pocket, a tiny mascot bear made to comfort soldiers during World War I. One night, Zephyrina brings back a dirty old bear, and Pocket is astounded. The new arrival, Berwon, might come from a lost shipment of the first-ever stuffed bears, sent from Germany to the U.S. in 1903—and if so, he’s worth a fortune. In the ensuing antics, the unpleasant villain Picky Vicky covets Berwon, and a kind museum curator does, too, but for different reasons. Applegate’s writing is exquisitely nuanced; she couches profound themes in accessible language that depicts relatable situations. Gentle, generous Elizaveta and Dasha poignantly underscore the human impact of wars. Santoso’s enchanting, delicate, black-and-white illustrations bring the timeless feeling of a classic to this hopeful, humanizing story of the distressed looking out for each other.
Poignant and heartwarming. (author’s note) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 9, 2025
ISBN: 9781250904362
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: July 3, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
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