It’s a cow’s life, until Cappuccina gets it in her head that town looks a lot more fun than her pasture, in this candied grass-is-greener tale. Cappuccina is a substantial Holstein who lives at Farmer Fiori’s farm. Her hayfield has a view to a hilltop town, where she imagines people having much merriment. Occasionally, she’d even like to be human. When a storm results in a break in her fence, she makes a dash for the bright lights. But when she tries to deck herself out as a human—Cappuccina’s idea of humanness is going shopping, which is perhaps the more subversive lesson in this story—she finds the shoes don’t fit her hooves, the hat won’t settle on her horns, and the dress won’t drape properly over her tail. A hairdresser comes to the rescue with a pretty bow tie for her afterpart, and then it dawns on Cappuccina: “She really was just perfect as herself.” She returns to her pasture, where Farmer Fiori remarks, “Your life is so peaceful. . . . Sometimes I wish I were a cow,” which sets things up for the sequel. A story of flouncy cuteness, both in the text (“ ‘I will get a pretty dress to wear.’ Tossing her head in a friendly way, she stepped over to the dressmaker’s”) and in the artwork, all tropical colors and enough enormous grins on each page to make your teeth ache. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 2001
ISBN: 1-55074-807-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Kids Can
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2002
Perfect for those looking for a scary Halloween tale that won’t leave them with more fears than they started with. Pair with...
Reynolds and Brown have crafted a Halloween tale that balances a really spooky premise with the hilarity that accompanies any mention of underwear.
Jasper Rabbit needs new underwear. Plain White satisfies him until he spies them: “Creepy underwear! So creepy! So comfy! They were glorious.” The underwear of his dreams is a pair of radioactive-green briefs with a Frankenstein face on the front, the green color standing out all the more due to Brown’s choice to do the entire book in grayscale save for the underwear’s glowing green…and glow they do, as Jasper soon discovers. Despite his “I’m a big rabbit” assertion, that glow creeps him out, so he stuffs them in the hamper and dons Plain White. In the morning, though, he’s wearing green! He goes to increasing lengths to get rid of the glowing menace, but they don’t stay gone. It’s only when Jasper finally admits to himself that maybe he’s not such a big rabbit after all that he thinks of a clever solution to his fear of the dark. Brown’s illustrations keep the backgrounds and details simple so readers focus on Jasper’s every emotion, writ large on his expressive face. And careful observers will note that the underwear’s expression also changes, adding a bit more creep to the tale.
Perfect for those looking for a scary Halloween tale that won’t leave them with more fears than they started with. Pair with Dr. Seuss’ tale of animate, empty pants. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Aug. 22, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4424-0298-0
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
The wriggly narrator of Diary of a Worm (2003) puts in occasional appearances, but it’s his arachnid buddy who takes center stage here, with terse, tongue-in-cheek comments on his likes (his close friend Fly, Charlotte’s Web), his dislikes (vacuums, people with big feet), nervous encounters with a huge Daddy Longlegs, his extended family—which includes a Grandpa more than willing to share hard-won wisdom (The secret to a long, happy life: “Never fall asleep in a shoe.”)—and mishaps both at spider school and on the human playground. Bliss endows his garden-dwellers with faces and the odd hat or other accessory, and creates cozy webs or burrows colorfully decorated with corks, scraps, plastic toys and other human detritus. Spider closes with the notion that we could all get along, “just like me and Fly,” if we but got to know one another. Once again, brilliantly hilarious. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-06-000153-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Joanna Cotler/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2005
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