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THE GREAT BIG BOOK OF FEELINGS

Name: THE GREAT BIG BOOK OF FEELINGS
Author: Mary Hoffman
ISBN: 978-1-84780-281-1

by Mary Hoffman ; illustrated by Ros Asquith ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 13, 2013

Well-intentioned but only intermittently effective.

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A smorgasbord of thoughts and pictures about a variety of feelings.

“How do you feel today?” the author asks. Framed portraits, more than a dozen over one spread, show children expressing a range of feelings. “It isn’t always easy to tell.” (A statement belied by this array of evocative faces.) Following this introduction, several double-page spreads put a feeling at the top of the left-hand page and fill the rest with examples in text and illustration. (Some opposites, like shy and confident, merit a facing page each.) Design choices add impact; the letters of sad seem to droop within a cloud of blue, while happy has dancing letters in a field of yellow bordered by multicolor fringe. The other 13 feelings include such usual suspects as scared, silly and angry, as well as some not so often plumbed, such as satisfied, jealous and embarrassed. It all ends with a big illustration of a handful of children putting the finishing touches on a big mural of several children displaying their feelings. Thanks to the abundance of examples, the book is predictably hit-and-miss; should interested be identified as a feeling? Too, the text is sometimes starchy and seems aimed at an older audience than the illustrations.

Well-intentioned but only intermittently effective. (Picture book. 3-7)

Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2013

ISBN: 978-1-84780-281-1

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Frances Lincoln

Review Posted Online: July 30, 2013

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2013

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
BABIES, BABIES EVERYWHERE!
by Mary Hoffman ; illustrated by Ros Asquith

- BOOK REVIEW
THE GREAT BIG BRAIN BOOK
by Mary Hoffman ; illustrated by Ros Asquith

- BOOK REVIEW
PIRATE BABY
by Mary Hoffman ; illustrated by Ros Asquith

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CARPENTER'S HELPER

by Sybil Rosen ; illustrated by Camille Garoche ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 16, 2021

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.

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A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.

Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)

Pub Date: March 16, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random

Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)