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CHRISTMAS EVE MAGIC

Barton is an unhappy porcine version of Scrooge in this story that parallels the plot of A Christmas Carol, but on a simpler level and with an all-animal cast. As the story opens on Christmas Eve, five homeless orphans (including a one-legged dog named Lulu in the Tiny Tim role) are staring hungrily into the tempting window of a bakery. They still retain the Christmas spirit, but Barton the pig is shut up in his lonely mansion with his servants, hating Christmas and wishing it were over. A wise mouse appears to help Barton, who himself shrinks to mouse-size as the clock strikes midnight. Barton sees Christmas past, present and future, and his transformation is as complete and sudden as Scrooge’s. He invites the orphan animals home for a festive dinner and declares them his “friends forever.” Poulin’s paintings have a dark, surrealistic quality suggesting the physical and spiritual poverty that endanger the characters, but even the illustrations after Barton’s epiphany fail to convey much warmth. This simplified interpretation of the Dickensian tale may help children understand the plot structure before seeing a performance of the play, but otherwise there’s little magic here. (Fiction. 6-10)

Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2006

ISBN: 1-55337-953-5

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Kids Can

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2006

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TROUBLING TONSILS!

From the Jasper Rabbit's Creepy Tales! series

Extraordinary introductory terror, beautiful to the eye and sure to delight younger horror enthusiasts.

What terrors lurk within your mouth? Jasper Rabbit knows.

“You have stumbled your way into the unknown.” The young bunny introduced in Reynolds and Brown’s Caldecott Honor–winning picture book, Creepy Carrots (2012), takes up Rod Serling’s mantle, and the fit is perfect. Mimicking an episode of The Twilight Zone, the book follows Charlie Marmot, an average kid with a penchant for the strange and unusual. He’s pleased when his tonsils become infected; maybe once they’re out he can take them to school for show and tell! That’s when bizarre things start to happen: Noises in the night. Slimy trails on his bedroom floor. And when Charlie goes in for his surgery, he’s told that the tonsils have disappeared from his throat; clearly something sinister is afoot. Those not yet ready for Goosebumps levels of horror will find this a welcome starter pack. Reynolds has perfected the tension he employed in his Creepy Tales! series, and partner in crime Brown imbues each illustration with both humor and a delicate undercurrent of dark foreshadowing. While the fleshy pink tonsils—the sole spot of color in this black-and-white world—aren’t outrageously gross, there’s something distinctly disgusting about them. And though the book stars cute, furry woodland creatures, the spooky surprise ending is 100% otherworldly—a marvelous moment of twisted logic.

Extraordinary introductory terror, beautiful to the eye and sure to delight younger horror enthusiasts. (Early chapter book. 6-9)

Pub Date: Sept. 2, 2025

ISBN: 9781665961080

Page Count: 88

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: May 30, 2025

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2025

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DIARY OF A SPIDER

The wriggly narrator of Diary of a Worm (2003) puts in occasional appearances, but it’s his arachnid buddy who takes center stage here, with terse, tongue-in-cheek comments on his likes (his close friend Fly, Charlotte’s Web), his dislikes (vacuums, people with big feet), nervous encounters with a huge Daddy Longlegs, his extended family—which includes a Grandpa more than willing to share hard-won wisdom (The secret to a long, happy life: “Never fall asleep in a shoe.”)—and mishaps both at spider school and on the human playground. Bliss endows his garden-dwellers with faces and the odd hat or other accessory, and creates cozy webs or burrows colorfully decorated with corks, scraps, plastic toys and other human detritus. Spider closes with the notion that we could all get along, “just like me and Fly,” if we but got to know one another. Once again, brilliantly hilarious. (Picture book. 6-8)

Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2005

ISBN: 0-06-000153-4

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Joanna Cotler/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2005

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