Bound to be a repeat-reading request.
Meet some cute offspring—and many humans’ favorite little animal: ourselves.
This delightful book nails rhymes and rhythms and features relatable content. Confidently employing a familiar two-beat-per-line quatrain, Larsen cleverly incorporates the proper terms for the young of a wide variety of animals. Porcupettes, peeps, puggles, codlings, crias, eyas, keets, poult, and pinkies will be new to many readers, while other words, such as goslings, tadpoles, calves, and kits may be more familiar. The colorful, cartoon-style illustrations are sharp, and the layout is packed but clear and unfussy. The size of the images and typeface is likely too small for group use but perfect for a lap—and there’s plenty to pore over. From the first page, where the wombat’s joeys are scaling a fluffy ewe while two lambs cavort on the wombat’s back, to a scene where a puffin parent looks concerned as a pair of pufflings fight over a tasty fish, to an image of a cygnet catching a lift on a colt’s back, there’s a lot to see. The refrain “everyone grows” is accompanied by developmental sequences showing creatures such as penguins, octopuses, and meerkats maturing. Toward the end, the focus shifts: “You once were a baby.” Additional animals look on, bemused, as “you” learn to roll, crawl, and walk. Humans depicted are tan- or brown-skinned. Many more unidentified animals (such as the uncommon axolotl), some with unlabeled young, are portrayed; reader research advised.
Bound to be a repeat-reading request. (Informational picture book. 1-6)Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781665921442
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come.
Little Blue Truck and his pal Toad meet friends old and new on a springtime drive through the country.
This lift-the-flap, interactive entry in the popular Little Blue Truck series lacks the narrative strength and valuable life lessons of the original Little Blue Truck (2008) and its sequel, Little Blue Truck Leads the Way (2009). Both of those books, published for preschoolers rather than toddlers, featured rich storylines, dramatic, kinetic illustrations, and simple but valuable life lessons—the folly of taking oneself too seriously, the importance of friends, and the virtue of taking turns, for example. At about half the length and with half as much text as the aforementioned titles, this volume is a much quicker read. Less a story than a vernal celebration, the book depicts a bucolic drive through farmland and encounters with various animals and their young along the way. Beautifully rendered two-page tableaux teem with butterflies, blossoms, and vibrant pastel, springtime colors. Little Blue greets a sheep standing in the door of a barn: “Yoo-hoo, Sheep! / Beep-beep! / What’s new?” Folding back the durable, card-stock flap reveals the barn’s interior and an adorable set of twin lambs. Encounters with a duck and nine ducklings, a cow with a calf, a pig with 10 (!) piglets, a family of bunnies, and a chicken with a freshly hatched chick provide ample opportunity for counting and vocabulary work.
Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come. (Board book. 1-4)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-544-93809-0
Page Count: 16
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Perfect for Valentine’s Day, but the syrupy sweetness will cloy after the holiday.
Animal parents declare their love for their offspring in alphabetical order.
Each page displays an enormous capital letter, one line of verse with the keyword capitalized, and a loving nonhuman parent gazing adoringly at their baby. “A is for Always. I always love you more. / B is for Butterfly kisses. It’s you that I adore.” While not named or labelled as such, the A is also for an alligator and its hatchling and B is for a butterfly and a butterfly child (not a caterpillar—biology is not the aim of this title) interacting in some way with the said letter. For E there are an elephant and a calf; U features a unicorn and foal; and X, keyed to the last letter of the animal’s name, corresponds to a fox and three pups. The final double-page spread shows all the featured creatures and their babies as the last line declares: “Baby, I love you from A to Z!” The verse is standard fare and appropriately sentimental. The art is cartoony-cute and populated by suitably loving critters on solid backgrounds. Hearts accent each scene, but the theme of the project is never in any doubt.
Perfect for Valentine’s Day, but the syrupy sweetness will cloy after the holiday. (Board book. 1-3)Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-7282-2095-6
Page Count: 28
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Jan. 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2021
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