Benjy looks like Abraham Lincoln as only Catrow can evoke. From the day he is born, Benjy looks like Honest Abe, complete with protruding ears, wart, and beard. Every year, his birthday gift is the same—a stovepipe hat. School teasing is the worst part: “Hey, Stinkin’ Lincoln! Split any rails lately?” His parents send him to Camp What-Cha-Ma-Call-It where all the kids look like things: the Mona Lisa, a frog, a toaster, the backside of a horse. The camp experience brings Benjy friends and an appreciation for his face and the way he looks. What keeps the story from being grotesque are Catrow’s typical exaggerated caricatures that expand the brief text with humor and puns (a band-aid on Millard Fillmore Dam). The clever cover is even designed to look like a five-dollar bill. The message is upfront, but the silliness, á la The Simpsons (for which the author writes), will grab readers. Adults will need to explain the last scene as Benjy helps his baby brother—who looks like Richard Nixon. Ludicrous fun. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-8431-0271-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2003
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A validating and breathtaking next chapter of a Mother Goose favorite.
Humpty Dumpty, classically portrayed as an egg, recounts what happened after he fell off the wall in Santat’s latest.
An avid ornithophile, Humpty had loved being atop a high wall to be close to the birds, but after his fall and reassembly by the king’s men, high places—even his lofted bed—become intolerable. As he puts it, “There were some parts that couldn’t be healed with bandages and glue.” Although fear bars Humpty from many of his passions, it is the birds he misses the most, and he painstakingly builds (after several papercut-punctuated attempts) a beautiful paper plane to fly among them. But when the plane lands on the very wall Humpty has so doggedly been avoiding, he faces the choice of continuing to follow his fear or to break free of it, which he does, going from cracked egg to powerful flight in a sequence of stunning spreads. Santat applies his considerable talent for intertwining visual and textual, whimsy and gravity to his consideration of trauma and the oft-overlooked importance of self-determined recovery. While this newest addition to Santat’s successes will inevitably (and deservedly) be lauded, younger readers may not notice the de-emphasis of an equally important part of recovery: that it is not compulsory—it is OK not to be OK.
A validating and breathtaking next chapter of a Mother Goose favorite. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-62672-682-6
Page Count: 45
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A book that will make young dog-owners smile in recognition and confirm dogless readers' worst suspicions about the mayhem caused by pets, even winsome ones. Sam, who bears passing resemblance to an affable golden retriever, is praised for fetching the family newspaper, and goes on to fetch every other newspaper on the block. In the next story, only the children love Sam's swimming; he is yelled at by lifeguards and fishermen alike when he splashes through every watering hole he can find. Finally, there is woe to the entire family when Sam is bored and lonely for one long night. Boland has an essential message, captured in both both story and illustrations of this Easy-to-Read: Kids and dogs belong together, especially when it's a fun-loving canine like Sam. An appealing tale. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-8037-1530-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1996
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