Not only a special adoption story, but also a heartwarming look at the human-animal relationship.
At the center of this tale based on a true story is an adorable baby gorilla whose mother does not know how to take care of him.
When Umande is born on a winter night at the zoo, “[h]e cries, as if to say ‘Will you hold me?’ ” Unfortunately none of the other gorillas do. Faulconer writes simply, describing the facts of the situation. Readers are immediately drawn into the challenge that the zookeepers face. Around the clock, human caregivers groom, feed and model appropriate gorilla behavior to help ensure his future survival. Hartung uses oil glazes on sealed paper that is then rubbed or scratched to create textured effects. This technique allows the snowflakes to seem as if they are drifting off the page, and in other scenes, readers can almost feel the tufts of yellow hay that makes up Umande’s enclosed habitat. When he is about 8 months old, zookeepers decide to try and find a female gorilla at another zoo who can be a mother to Umande. Children will delight in seeing Umande peeking out the window of a plane and ultimately, over a period of weeks, connecting with Lulu, the gorilla who will be his new mom.
Not only a special adoption story, but also a heartwarming look at the human-animal relationship. (note) (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 3, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-8037-3762-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2014
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
A light dose of natural history, with occasional “EWWW!” for flavor
Having surveyed worms, spiders, flies, and head lice, Gravel continues her Disgusting Critters series with a quick hop through toad fact and fancy.
The facts are briefly presented in a hand-lettered–style typeface frequently interrupted by visually emphatic interjections (“TOXIN,” “PREY,” “EWWW!”). These are, as usual, paired to simply drawn cartoons with comments and punch lines in dialogue balloons. After casting glances at the common South American ancestor of frogs and toads, and at such exotic species as the Emei mustache toad (“Hey ladies!”), Gravel focuses on the common toad, Bufo bufo. Using feminine pronouns throughout, she describes diet and egg-laying, defense mechanisms, “warts,” development from tadpole to adult, and of course how toads shed and eat their skins. Noting that global warming and habitat destruction have rendered some species endangered or extinct, she closes with a plea and, harking back to those South American origins, an image of an outsized toad, arm in arm with a dark-skinned lad (in a track suit), waving goodbye: “Hasta la vista!”
A light dose of natural history, with occasional “EWWW!” for flavor . (Informational picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: July 5, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-77049-667-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tundra Books
Review Posted Online: April 12, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2016
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