A tale of father-child bonding full of visual appeal but unfocused in its storytelling.
A child narrates their springtime adventures against the backdrop of a field of old junk across from their school.
It’s easy to get into the head of the child protagonist, as the stream-of-consciousness narration is so perfectly childlike. At the end of a school day during which a girl brags about finding a two-headed frog, the child’s father meets them and walks them home in the rain across the field, talking about clouds and listening to frogs until it’s time to part ways. The child visits the field on their own, exploring the junk that lies about and remembering how they once screamed their anger and fear over their father’s moving out into the old echo-y silo. The spring rains flood the field, forming an ephemeral pond where the child-dad duo catch, examine, and release the tadpoles they find. James’ artwork combines acrylic, ink, gouache, cut paper, and photos. Readers will almost be able to feel the bumps and ridges in the thickly textured illustrations. While the close bond between father and child is quite evident, what’s unclear is what readers should take from this tale that jumps from topic to topic. Dad and the child share light skin and black hair; Dad sports a mustache. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A tale of father-child bonding full of visual appeal but unfocused in its storytelling. (notes about frogs and ephemeral ponds, author’s note, further reading) (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9780823450053
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Neal Porter/Holiday House
Review Posted Online: March 13, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2023
Quirky, familiar fun for series devotees.
After Duncan finds his crayons gone—yet again—letters arrive, detailing their adventures in friendship.
Eleven crayons send missives from their chosen spots throughout Duncan’s home (and one from his classroom). Red enjoys the thrill of extinguishing “pretend fires” with Duncan’s toy firetruck. White, so often dismissed as invisible, finds a new calling subbing in for the missing queen on the black-and-white chessboard. “Now everyone ALWAYS SEES ME!…(Well, half the time!)” Pink’s living the dream as a pastry chef helming the Breezy Bake Oven, “baking everything from little cupcakes…to…OTHER little cupcakes!” Teal, who’s hitched a ride to school in Duncan’s backpack, meets the crayons in the boy’s desk and writes, “Guess what? I HAVE A TWIN! How come you never told me?” Duncan wants to see his crayons and “meet their new friends.” A culminating dinner party assembles the crayons and their many guests: a table tennis ball, dog biscuits, a well-loved teddy bear, and more. The premise—personified crayons, away and back again—is well-trammeled territory by now, after over a dozen books and spinoffs, and Jeffers once more delivers his signature cartooning and hand-lettering. Though the pages lack the laugh-out-loud sight gags and side-splittingly funny asides of previous outings, readers—especially fans of the crayons’ previous outings—will enjoy checking in on their pals.
Quirky, familiar fun for series devotees. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 3, 2025
ISBN: 9780593622360
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: March 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
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)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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