Good for imagination and travel, this merry bus ride has glimmers of “Little Red Riding Hood” but is entirely itself.
Clara (named only on the book jacket) narrates her own story of the first time she goes to Grandma’s house on the bus by herself.
Of course, she isn’t really alone. Quite a cast of characters joins her on the wide, spacious vehicle. They are all animals dressed (more or less) in people clothes and doing what people do on buses: knitting; reading the newspaper (whose headlines often relate to the action); napping. In fact, the sloth pretty much sleeps through the whole trip. Clara shares a cookie with a friendly wolf tot, is kind of freaked out by the darkness as the bus goes through a tunnel, and notes the mix-up when the knitting owl’s blue chapeau ends up on someone else’s head and the baby wolf’s binky ends up in his dad’s mouth. She even helps thwart a robbery! In delicately sketched but clear strokes Dubuc takes characters and readers through countryside and forest, and Clara reaches her destination, where her grandmother waits for her at the bus stop, looking very like Clara’s own mom but with silver hair. The exaggerated proportions of the book (6.75 inches high and 11 inches wide) echo that of the bus Clara rides in and make for dramatic double-page spreads.
Good for imagination and travel, this merry bus ride has glimmers of “Little Red Riding Hood” but is entirely itself. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: March 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-77138-209-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Kids Can
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2014
A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift.
A paean to teachers and their surrogates everywhere.
This gentle ode to a teacher’s skill at inspiring, encouraging, and being a role model is spoken, presumably, from a child’s viewpoint. However, the voice could equally be that of an adult, because who can’t look back upon teachers or other early mentors who gave of themselves and offered their pupils so much? Indeed, some of the self-aware, self-assured expressions herein seem perhaps more realistic as uttered from one who’s already grown. Alternatively, readers won’t fail to note that this small book, illustrated with gentle soy-ink drawings and featuring an adult-child bear duo engaged in various sedentary and lively pursuits, could just as easily be about human parent- (or grandparent-) child pairs: some of the softly colored illustrations depict scenarios that are more likely to occur within a home and/or other family-oriented setting. Makes sense: aren’t parents and other close family members children’s first teachers? This duality suggests that the book might be best shared one-on-one between a nostalgic adult and a child who’s developed some self-confidence, having learned a thing or two from a parent, grandparent, older relative, or classroom instructor.
A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-943200-08-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Compendium
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
Although the love comes shining through, the text often confuses in straining for patterned simplicity.
A collection of parental wishes for a child.
It starts out simply enough: two children run pell-mell across an open field, one holding a high-flying kite with the line “I wish you more ups than downs.” But on subsequent pages, some of the analogous concepts are confusing or ambiguous. The line “I wish you more tippy-toes than deep” accompanies a picture of a boy happily swimming in a pool. His feet are visible, but it's not clear whether he's floating in the deep end or standing in the shallow. Then there's a picture of a boy on a beach, his pockets bulging with driftwood and colorful shells, looking frustrated that his pockets won't hold the rest of his beachcombing treasures, which lie tantalizingly before him on the sand. The line reads: “I wish you more treasures than pockets.” Most children will feel the better wish would be that he had just the right amount of pockets for his treasures. Some of the wordplay, such as “more can than knot” and “more pause than fast-forward,” will tickle older readers with their accompanying, comical illustrations. The beautifully simple pictures are a sweet, kid- and parent-appealing blend of comic-strip style and fine art; the cast of children depicted is commendably multiethnic.
Although the love comes shining through, the text often confuses in straining for patterned simplicity. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4521-2699-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2015
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