Betsy and her family live on the Nebraska prairie in this idyllic story of friendship. She is lonely because there are no girls her age to play with. When her father tells her about a new family, she hopes for a new friend. When she meets Mr. Fitzroy, her hopes are raised to hear he has a daughter, Emmeline, just about Betsy’s age. Betsy makes Emmeline a cornhusk doll, but is disappointed by her unenthusiastic response to the gift. Turns out that Emmeline is from St. Paul, and misses her porcelain dolls and all the toys she had to sell to move to Nebraska. The two girls get lost while berry-picking, and have to rely on Betsy’s understanding of the prairie, including her knowledge that sandhill cranes will lead them to the creek near home. The adventure solidifies their friendship in an all’s-well-that-ends-well conclusion. Much is left from the text: exactly when does this story take place? Why do they live so far from neighbors? What are the families doing in Nebraska? How do the families react to the girls’ disappearance? An author’s note fills in some of the blanks, but the information seems incomplete. Levinson mentions the differences between dugouts and soddies, but the illustrations and story have little to do with housing. No mention is made of the sandhill cranes, though most young readers will know little of their habits. For a more poignant and informative historical fiction about prairie life, friendship, and loneliness, refer to Eve Bunting’s Dandelions. (Easy reader. 5-8)
Pub Date: March 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-06-028001-8
Page Count: 64
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2003
Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your dreads! Isadora once again plies her hand using colorful, textured collages to depict her fourth fairy tale relocated to Africa. The narrative follows the basic story line: Taken by an evil sorceress at birth, Rapunzel is imprisoned in a tower; Rapunzel and the prince “get married” in the tower and she gets pregnant. The sorceress cuts off Rapunzel’s hair and tricks the prince, who throws himself from the tower and is blinded by thorns. The terse ending states: “The prince led Rapunzel and their twins to his kingdom, where they were received with great joy and lived happily every after.” Facial features, clothing, dreadlocks, vultures and the prince riding a zebra convey a generic African setting, but at times, the mixture of patterns and textures obfuscates the scenes. The textile and grain characteristic of the hewn art lacks the elegant romance of Zelinksy’s Caldecott version. Not a first purchase, but useful in comparing renditions to incorporate a multicultural aspect. (Picture book/fairy tale. 6-8)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-399-24772-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This story covers the few days preceding the much-anticipated Midnight Zombie Walk, when Stink and company will take to the...
An all-zombie-all-the-time zombiefest, featuring a bunch of grade-school kids, including protagonist Stink and his happy comrades.
This story covers the few days preceding the much-anticipated Midnight Zombie Walk, when Stink and company will take to the streets in the time-honored stiff-armed, stiff-legged fashion. McDonald signals her intent on page one: “Stink and Webster were playing Attack of the Knitting Needle Zombies when Fred Zombie’s eye fell off and rolled across the floor.” The farce is as broad as the Atlantic, with enough spookiness just below the surface to provide the all-important shivers. Accompanied by Reynolds’ drawings—dozens of scene-setting gems with good, creepy living dead—McDonald shapes chapters around zombie motifs: making zombie costumes, eating zombie fare at school, reading zombie books each other to reach the one-million-minutes-of-reading challenge. When the zombie walk happens, it delivers solid zombie awfulness. McDonald’s feel-good tone is deeply encouraging for readers to get up and do this for themselves because it looks like so much darned fun, while the sub-message—that reading grows “strong hearts and minds,” as well as teeth and bones—is enough of a vital interest to the story line to be taken at face value.Pub Date: March 13, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-7636-5692-8
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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