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SHARING A SMILE

Name: SHARING A SMILE
Author: Nicki Kramar
ISBN: 978-1-5344-9785-6

by Nicki Kramar ; illustrated by Ashley Evans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 2021

Helpful and timely for children and their grown-ups.

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Sophie and her grandfather figure out how to make wearing masks easier for themselves and their neighbors.

Sophie, a small girl, is inside her home with her grandfather watching the world change. Both have brown skin and dark, textured hair. He explains to her that “We all have to wear masks to keep everyone safe.” All her neighbors and the mail carrier are now wearing masks, just like the Hara family has always done outside, even before the pandemic. Most people are doing the things they always do—gardening, riding bikes, and playing—but she cannot see their smiles. Grandpa says that change is hard, and friends can help. This gives Sophie an idea. They both stay up late, sketching and sewing, and the following day, they surprise the neighbors with personalized gifts to make the change easier. As Sophie grows from worry and confusion to understanding and helping, readers learn to name feelings they may be experiencing themselves. The people who live on Sophie’s street are racially and ethnically diverse, and her neighbors are friendly. The bright illustrations use clean lines, white space, and swaths of texture to depict a close-knit community of personalities who care for one another and commit to the common good. Powerful in its simplicity, this story contains lots of social and emotional learning in a small package. (This book was reviewed digitally with 11-by-18-inch double-page spreads viewed at 64.2% of actual size.)

Helpful and timely for children and their grown-ups. (Picture book. 3-9)

Pub Date: Feb. 23, 2021

ISBN: 978-1-5344-9785-6

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2021

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S HEALTH & DAILY LIVING

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CARPENTER'S HELPER

by Sybil Rosen ; illustrated by Camille Garoche ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 16, 2021

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.

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A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.

Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)

Pub Date: March 16, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random

Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

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LOVE FROM THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR

by Eric Carle ; illustrated by Eric Carle ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 15, 2015

Safe to creep on by.

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Carle’s famous caterpillar expresses its love.

In three sentences that stretch out over most of the book’s 32 pages, the (here, at least) not-so-ravenous larva first describes the object of its love, then describes how that loved one makes it feel before concluding, “That’s why… / I[heart]U.” There is little original in either visual or textual content, much of it mined from The Very Hungry Caterpillar. “You are… / …so sweet,” proclaims the caterpillar as it crawls through the hole it’s munched in a strawberry; “…the cherry on my cake,” it says as it perches on the familiar square of chocolate cake; “…the apple of my eye,” it announces as it emerges from an apple. Images familiar from other works join the smiling sun that shone down on the caterpillar as it delivers assurances that “you make… / …the sun shine brighter / …the stars sparkle,” and so on. The book is small, only 7 inches high and 5 ¾ inches across when closed—probably not coincidentally about the size of a greeting card. While generations of children have grown up with the ravenous caterpillar, this collection of Carle imagery and platitudinous sentiment has little of his classic’s charm. The melding of Carle’s caterpillar with Robert Indiana’s iconic LOVE on the book’s cover, alas, draws further attention to its derivative nature.

Safe to creep on by. (Picture book. 3-6)