Affirming and uplifting.
Oliver, a neurodivergent child introduced in Hunt’s novel Fish in a Tree (2015), makes his picture-book debut.
Oliver feels like “a dragon in a paper house.” While his classmates work quietly, he fidgets and involuntarily makes noises. His brain “blazes.” He imagines his pencil as a rocket, and his mind fills with questions: Could a pencil rocket reach Saturn’s rings? Shay, the class bully, calls him “weird” and “lazy,” unlike “the rest of us”—but the things Oliver says to himself hurt even more. At recess, Oliver makes a wish: “Please…please make me more like the rest of them.” Fortunately, not everyone is like Shay. Jada’s impressed by Oliver’s knowledge of ants, and Albert reminds him that famous inventors, scientists, and artists persisted despite being mocked: “Just imagine the things we wouldn’t have without all of your astonishing brains!” Cheered, Oliver dubs Jada and Albert his “colony”: “In an ant colony, everyone matters.” Now he’s proud to be a dragon in a paper house: “Isn’t it good to have a little fire inside?” Though the dialogue is somewhat heavy-handed, readers, especially those with learning differences, will appreciate the message that, like a tree with colorful autumn leaves, the world is “most beautiful” when people are all different. Energetic cartoon illustrations cleverly convey Oliver’s vivid imagination as well as his emotions. Most characters, including Oliver, have light skin; Jada is brown-skinned.
Affirming and uplifting. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: May 20, 2025
ISBN: 9781524739683
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: March 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
Inspiration, shrink wrapped.
From an artist, poet, and Instagram celebrity, a pep talk for all who question where a new road might lead.
Opening by asking readers, “Have you ever wanted to go in a different direction,” the unnamed narrator describes having such a feeling and then witnessing the appearance of a new road “almost as if it were magic.” “Where do you lead?” the narrator asks. The Road’s twice-iterated response—“Be a leader and find out”—bookends a dialogue in which a traveler’s anxieties are answered by platitudes. “What if I fall?” worries the narrator in a stylized, faux hand-lettered type Wade’s Instagram followers will recognize. The Road’s dialogue and the narration are set in a chunky, sans-serif type with no quotation marks, so the one flows into the other confusingly. “Everyone falls at some point, said the Road. / But I will always be there when you land.” Narrator: “What if the world around us is filled with hate?” Road: “Lead it to love.” Narrator: “What if I feel stuck?” Road: “Keep going.” De Moyencourt illustrates this colloquy with luminous scenes of a small, brown-skinned child, face turned away from viewers so all they see is a mop of blond curls. The child steps into an urban mural, walks along a winding country road through broad rural landscapes and scary woods, climbs a rugged metaphorical mountain, then comes to stand at last, Little Prince–like, on a tiny blue and green planet. Wade’s closing claim that her message isn’t meant just for children is likely superfluous…in fact, forget the just.
Inspiration, shrink wrapped. (Picture book. 6-8, adult)Pub Date: March 23, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-26949-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: April 7, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
A lesson that never grows old, enacted with verve by two favorite friends
Gerald the elephant learns a truth familiar to every preschooler—heck, every human: “Waiting is not easy!”
When Piggie cartwheels up to Gerald announcing that she has a surprise for him, Gerald is less than pleased to learn that the “surprise is a surprise.” Gerald pumps Piggie for information (it’s big, it’s pretty, and they can share it), but Piggie holds fast on this basic principle: Gerald will have to wait. Gerald lets out an almighty “GROAN!” Variations on this basic exchange occur throughout the day; Gerald pleads, Piggie insists they must wait; Gerald groans. As the day turns to twilight (signaled by the backgrounds that darken from mauve to gray to charcoal), Gerald gets grumpy. “WE HAVE WASTED THE WHOLE DAY!…And for WHAT!?” Piggie then gestures up to the Milky Way, which an awed Gerald acknowledges “was worth the wait.” Willems relies even more than usual on the slightest of changes in posture, layout and typography, as two waiting figures can’t help but be pretty static. At one point, Piggie assumes the lotus position, infuriating Gerald. Most amusingly, Gerald’s elephantine groans assume weighty physicality in spread-filling speech bubbles that knock Piggie to the ground. And the spectacular, photo-collaged images of the Milky Way that dwarf the two friends makes it clear that it was indeed worth the wait.
A lesson that never grows old, enacted with verve by two favorite friends . (Early reader. 6-8)Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4231-9957-1
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Hyperion
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2014
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