Day’s picture-book debut purports to encourage ingenuity, perseverance, and girls’ interest in STEM but falls short of its...
Their trash is her treasure, and she’ll prove its value to the naysayers in town.
Sylvia Samantha Wright seems to be the only person who sees the potential in discarded objects such as old pipes, overstock party hats, and half-rotten bananas. When skeptics comment on her habit of collecting junk, she doggedly says she’s “working on something.” However, when elderly Ezekiel Mather finally asks what she’s working on, she confesses that she doesn’t know. He encourages her, saying: “That’s the best part….The part before you know.” A series of townwide disasters gives Sylvia an opportunity to demonstrate how the junk she collects can be utilized in feats of engineering and problem-solving. Cartoonish line drawings with colorful, textural accents support the exaggerated silliness of the disasters, but the text’s humor somewhat tarnishes the sincerity of its empowering message. An unnecessarily wordy recurring punchline concerns an incompetent female mayor (no room for two intelligent female characters with agency in this town!). (It’s also a pretty homogeneous town; all the named characters are white, with only a few scattered characters of color in the occasional background.) Despite Sylvia’s refrain, “I’m working on something,” both text and illustrations avoid depicting her much-hyped problem-solving process by leapfrogging over it to the final results of her efforts.
Day’s picture-book debut purports to encourage ingenuity, perseverance, and girls’ interest in STEM but falls short of its potential. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: July 15, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-58536-400-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Review Posted Online: April 24, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A thoughtful role model for aspiring inventors.
In this collaboration from mother/daughter duo Corrigan and Corrigan Lichty, a youngster longs to quit the soccer team so she can continue dreaming up more inventions.
Marianne, a snazzily dressed young maker with tan skin, polka-dot glasses, and reddish-brown hair in two buns, feels out of place on the pitch. Her soccer-loving dad signed her up for the team, but she’d much rather be home tinkering and creating. One day she feigns illness to get out of practice (relying on a trick she learned from the film Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) and uses her newfound time to create a flying machine made from bath towels, umbrellas, cans, and more. Eventually, her dad catches wind of her deception, and she tells him she prefers inventing to playing soccer. Immediately supportive, he plops a pot on his head and becomes Marianne’s tinkering apprentice. Told in lilting rhymes, the story resolves its conflicts rather speedily (Marianne confesses to hating soccer in one swift line). Though the text is wordy at times, it’s quite jaunty, and adults (and retro-loving kids) will chuckle at the ’80s references, from the Ferris Bueller and Dirty Dancing movie posters in Marianne’s room to the name of her dog, Patrick Swayze. True to Marianne’s creative nature, Sweetland surrounds her with lots of clutter and scraps, as well as plenty of bits and bobs. One never knows where inspiration will strike next.
A thoughtful role model for aspiring inventors. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 3, 2025
ISBN: 9780593206096
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Flamingo Books
Review Posted Online: March 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
A good bet for the youngest bird-watchers.
Echoing the meter of “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” Ward uses catchy original rhymes to describe the variety of nests birds create.
Each sweet stanza is complemented by a factual, engaging description of the nesting habits of each bird. Some of the notes are intriguing, such as the fact that the hummingbird uses flexible spider web to construct its cup-shaped nest so the nest will stretch as the chicks grow. An especially endearing nesting behavior is that of the emperor penguin, who, with unbelievable patience, incubates the egg between his tummy and his feet for up to 60 days. The author clearly feels a mission to impart her extensive knowledge of birds and bird behavior to the very young, and she’s found an appealing and attractive way to accomplish this. The simple rhymes on the left page of each spread, written from the young bird’s perspective, will appeal to younger children, and the notes on the right-hand page of each spread provide more complex factual information that will help parents answer further questions and satisfy the curiosity of older children. Jenkins’ accomplished collage illustrations of common bird species—woodpecker, hummingbird, cowbird, emperor penguin, eagle, owl, wren—as well as exotics, such as flamingoes and hornbills, are characteristically naturalistic and accurate in detail.
A good bet for the youngest bird-watchers. (author’s note, further resources) (Informational picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 18, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4424-2116-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 3, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2014
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