An oversized, ambitious collection of verse that, in the end, proves sadly forgettable.
Over 120 poems, with accompanying illustrations, selected to help young readers discover the pleasures of committing verse to memory.
A good anthology, like a Whitman’s Sampler, should sate an immediate desire for sweet connection with its subject while whetting the appetite for fuller indulgence later on. This collection, so full of promise given the combined talents of these longtime collaborators, falls short of that mark. Touted as a sampling of poems both “ ‘easy to remember’ and ‘worth remembering,’ ” it should present works that sit easily in the ear and/or prove memorable for their overall effect. While Hoberman does exhume a few gems from the vast corpus of British and American verse, and Emberley’s vivid characters make the space surrounding the selected works visually appealing to younger readers, the marriage of word and image here is not always a happy one. For example, next to Dickinson’s celebrated “I’m nobody! Who are you?” an overalls-clad, mouth-less boy looks quizzically at the close-lipped frog in his hands. Dickinson’s “frog,” who famously tells its “name the livelong day / To an admiring bog,” is anything but silent. Moreover, the grouping of poems throughout—sometimes by form, others by content—seems arbitrary, ultimately making the collection’s most memorable aspects Hoberman’s introduction and concluding “suggestions for learning poetry by heart.”
An oversized, ambitious collection of verse that, in the end, proves sadly forgettable. (Poetry. 8-14)Pub Date: April 3, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-316-12947-3
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: March 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Though usually cast as the trickster, Coyote is more victim than victimizer, making this a nice complement to other Coyote...
Two republished tales by a Greco-Cherokee author feature both folkloric and modern elements as well as new illustrations.
One of the two has never been offered south of the (Canadian) border. In “Coyote Sings to the Moon,” the doo-wop hymn sung nightly by Old Woman and all the animals except tone-deaf Coyote isn’t enough to keep Moon from hiding out at the bottom of the lake—until she is finally driven forth by Coyote’s awful wailing. She has been trying to return to the lake ever since, but that piercing howl keeps her in the sky. In “Coyote’s New Suit” he is schooled in trickery by Raven, who convinces him to steal the pelts of all the other animals while they’re bathing, sends the bare animals to take clothes from the humans’ clothesline, and then sets the stage for a ruckus by suggesting that Coyote could make space in his overcrowded closet by having a yard sale. No violence ensues, but from then to now humans and animals have not spoken to one another. In Eggenschwiler’s monochrome scenes Coyote and the rest stand on hind legs and (when stripped bare) sport human limbs. Old Woman might be Native American; the only other completely human figure is a pale-skinned girl.
Though usually cast as the trickster, Coyote is more victim than victimizer, making this a nice complement to other Coyote tales. (Fiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-55498-833-4
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Groundwood
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2017
Gleefully providing ammunition for snarky readers eager to second-guess misguided beliefs and commands of grown-ups, Rondina dishes up the straight poop on dozens of topics from the cleanliness of a dog’s mouth and the relationship (none) between French fries and acne to whether an earwig could really crawl into your ear and eat your brains. Since she cites no readily checkable sources—support for assertions comes in the form of quotations from experts in various fields, but there is no bibliography—it’s hard to tell how accurate some of her claims are—it would be nice to have a citation to the JAMA studies that debunk the sugar-hyperactivity connection, for instance—and too often she provides only an unsatisfying “You Decide” instead of a clear “True” or “False.” Still, it all makes painless reading equally suitable for casual dipping or reading straight through, and Sylvester’s pen-and-ink spot art adds further light notes to every page. An extensive closing catalog of familiar “Parentisms”—“I’m not running a taxi service,” “Because I said so, that’s why,” etc.—adds a chuckle-inducing lagniappe. (Informational ephemera. 9-11)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-55453-454-8
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Kids Can
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2010
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