Like food-truck fare, it goes down easily.
Frankie’s food truck makes the rounds every day of the week, mixing gastronomy with geometry in this interactive guide to the shapes of things to eat.
This volume serves up a tasty variety of vocabulary, including the days of the week, basic shapes, and various foodstuffs that young readers and their caregivers are invited to identify. Frankie is an undeniably cute kitten with an oversized head and a smile to match. He parks his food truck in the same spot every day of the week; the cityscape in the background never changes. The one thing that is dramatically different from day to day is the menu, organized around daily geometric themes: “Today is Monday, when Frankie serves squares.” This is not a jab at Frankie’s patrons; it describes his fare, served on the facing page on four empty-looking plates with square-shaped, flapped panels that open to reveal several delicious, square-shaped foods: waffles, toast, ravioli, and cheese. Triangles are Tuesday’s order of the day; three triangular flaps reveal slices of pizza, pie, and watermelon. A circular flap hides a doughnut; the text inside the flap reads, “Nope! No circles till tomorrow!” Frankie himself is rendered differently in each picture, but only slightly so; finding the differences from picture to picture may add an element of fun.
Like food-truck fare, it goes down easily. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5362-0687-6
Page Count: 12
Publisher: Candlewick Entertainment
Review Posted Online: Dec. 17, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An upbeat early book on feelings with a simple storyline that little ones will respond to.
This simplified version of Diesen and Hanna’s The Pout-Pout Fish (2008) is appropriate for babies and toddlers.
Brief, rhyming text tells the story of a sullen fish cheered up with a kiss. A little pink sea creature pokes his head out of a hole in the sea bottom to give the gloomy fish some advice: “Smile, Mr. Fish! / You look so down // With your glum-glum face / And your pout-pout frown.” He explains that there’s no reason to be worried, scared, sad or mad and concludes: “How about a smooch? / And a cheer-up wish? // Now you look happy: / What a smile, Mr. Fish!” Simple and sweet, this tale offers the lesson that sometimes, all that’s needed for a turnaround in mood is some cheer and encouragement to change our perspective. The clean, uncluttered illustrations are kept simple, except for the pout-pout fish’s features, which are delightfully expressive. Little ones will easily recognize and likely try to copy the sad, scared and angry looks that cross the fish’s face.
An upbeat early book on feelings with a simple storyline that little ones will respond to. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-374-37084-8
Page Count: 12
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Clear nonfiction for the very young is hard to come by, and it appears that the Look & Learn series may finally be on...
An exploration of the human body through colorful photos.
Every other double-page spread labels the individual parts on one major area: head, torso, back, arm and leg. Ethnically diverse boy-girl pairs serve as models as arrows point to specific features and captions float nearby. While the book usefully mentions rarely depicted body parts, such as eyebrow, armpit and shin, some of the directional arrows are unclear. The arrow pointing at a girl’s shoulder hits her in the upper arm, and the belly button is hard is distinguish from the stomach (both are concealed by shirts). Facts about the human body (“Guess what? You have tiny hairs in your nose that keep out dirt”) appear on alternating spreads along with photos of kids in action. Baby Animals, another title in the Look & Learn series, uses an identical format to introduce readers to seal pups, leopard cubs, elephant calves, ducklings and tadpoles. In both titles, the final spread offers a review of the information and encourages readers to match baby animals to their parents or find body parts on a photo of kids jumping on a trampoline.
Clear nonfiction for the very young is hard to come by, and it appears that the Look & Learn series may finally be on the right track despite earlier titles that were much too conceptual for the audience. (Board book. 18 mos.-3)Pub Date: Feb. 11, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4263-1483-4
Page Count: 24
Publisher: National Geographic
Review Posted Online: April 29, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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