This original Christmas story with a Nativity setting features a girl as the main character, a welcome addition to the flock of stories about visitors to the Manger. Naomi is a beggar girl who hears about the Magi arriving to see the Christ Child. When she goes to the stable and tries to steal a gold coin from the gifts of the Magi, Joseph and Mary meet Naomi’s attempted theft with kindness and forgiveness. Naomi meets the Christ Child, sings a long-forgotten lullaby to him and then walks out of Bethlehem with Joseph, Mary and the baby. They give her a wooden flute that had been given to the baby by a shepherd, and Naomi is able to play music immediately, earning coins through her newfound talent. The text implies that this gift of music is a blessing from the Christ Child to help the girl with her future. The story is a moving one, although the final spread is overly emotional in both words and illustration. Soft-focus illustrations of the nighttime story are suffused with blue light and highlighted with tiny flecks of white that suggest magical starlight. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 11, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-375-83447-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2007
A stocking stuffer par excellence, just right for dishing up with milk and cookies.
Pigeon finds something better to drive than some old bus.
This time it’s Santa delivering the fateful titular words, and with a “Ho. Ho. Whoa!” the badgering begins: “C’mon! Where’s your holiday spirit? It would be a Christmas MIRACLE! Don’t you want to be part of a Christmas miracle…?” Pigeon is determined: “I can do Santa stuff!” Like wrapping gifts (though the accompanying illustration shows a rather untidy present), delivering them (the image of Pigeon attempting to get an oversize sack down a chimney will have little ones giggling), and eating plenty of cookies. Alas, as Willems’ legion of young fans will gleefully predict, not even Pigeon’s by-now well-honed persuasive powers (“I CAN BE JOLLY!”) will budge the sleigh’s large and stinky reindeer guardian. “BAH. Also humbug.” In the typically minimalist art, the frustrated feathered one sports a floppily expressive green and red elf hat for this seasonal addition to the series—but then discards it at the end for, uh oh, a pair of bunny ears. What could Pigeon have in mind now? “Egg delivery, anyone?”
A stocking stuffer par excellence, just right for dishing up with milk and cookies. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Sept. 5, 2023
ISBN: 9781454952770
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Union Square Kids
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2023
Turkey’s in the “kind of trouble where it’s almost Thanksgiving...and you’re the main course.” Accordingly, Turkey tries on disguise after disguise, from horse to cow to pig to sheep, at each iteration being told that he looks nothing like the animal he’s trying to mimic (which is quite true, as Harper’s quirky watercolors make crystal clear). He desperately squeezes a red rubber glove onto his head to pass as a rooster, only to overhear the farmer suggest a poultry plan B when he’s unable to turn up the turkey. Turkey’s horrified expression as he stands among the peppers and tomatoes—in November? Chalk it up to artistic license—is priceless, but his surroundings give him an idea. Good fun, but it may lead to a vegetarian table or two. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-7614-5529-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Marshall Cavendish
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2009
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