This fun, fast-paced narrative will have readers eager to turn the page and imagine their own fanciful scenarios
Written in the form of a dialogue, this British import traces the (imaginary!) adventures of a young South Asian boy, Nimesh, on his way home from school.
A voice, presumably an adult’s, asks Nimesh generic questions about school and about his walk home. Nimesh, however, constantly corrects the voice’s (and consequently readers’) assumptions about where he is and what he’s doing. For instance, in the very first double-page spread, a group of children crowd around a book named How to Tame a Dragon in 7 Days. The interrogative text reads, “Hello Nimesh, is school over?”—to which Nimesh responds, “School? My friend, this is not a school! It’s an ancient cave, and shhhh! Or you’ll wake… // …the DRAGON!” Turning the page reveals a dragon wearing Mary Jane pumps, face down and fast asleep atop a book at the teacher’s desk. A bottle of mineral water on the desk simultaneously acknowledges the hilarity of Nimesh’s imagination and allows readers to interpret Nimesh’s exhausted teacher reimagined as a dragon. Amini’s collagelike images depicting Nimesh’s numerous adventures—swimming with sharks, fighting pirates aboard a pirate ship, and skating across the ice at the North Pole, to name a few—complement both Singh’s tongue-in-cheek narrative and Nimesh’s far-reaching imagination.
This fun, fast-paced narrative will have readers eager to turn the page and imagine their own fanciful scenarios . (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: April 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-911373-24-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Lantana
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2018
A jam-packed opener sure to satisfy lovers of the princess genre.
Ice princess Lina must navigate family and school in this early chapter read.
The family picnic is today. This is not a typical gathering, since Lina’s maternal relatives are a royal family of Windtamers who have power over the weather and live in castles floating on clouds. Lina herself is mixed race, with black hair and a tan complexion like her Asian-presenting mother’s; her Groundling father appears to be a white human. While making a grand entrance at the castle of her grandfather, the North Wind, she fails to successfully ride a gust of wind and crashes in front of her entire family. This prompts her stern grandfather to ask that Lina move in with him so he can teach her to control her powers. Desperate to avoid this, Lina and her friend Claudia, who is black, get Lina accepted at the Hilltop Science and Arts Academy. Lina’s parents allow her to go as long as she does lessons with grandpa on Saturdays. However, fitting in at a Groundling school is rough, especially when your powers start freak winter storms! With the story unfurling in diary format, bright-pink–highlighted grayscale illustrations help move the plot along. There are slight gaps in the storytelling and the pacing is occasionally uneven, but Lina is full of spunk and promotes self-acceptance.
A jam-packed opener sure to satisfy lovers of the princess genre. (Fantasy. 5-8)Pub Date: June 25, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-338-35393-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2019
A sweet, if oft-told, story.
A plush toy rabbit bonds with a boy and watches him grow into adulthood.
The boy receives the blue bunny for his birthday and immediately becomes attached to it. Unbeknownst to him, the ungendered bunny is sentient; it engages in dialogue with fellow toys, giving readers insight into its thoughts. The bunny's goal is to have grand adventures when the boy grows up and no longer needs its company. The boy spends many years playing imaginatively with the bunny, holding it close during both joyous and sorrowful times and taking it along on family trips. As a young man, he marries, starts a family, and hands over the beloved toy to his toddler-aged child in a crib. The bunny's epiphany—that he does not need to wait for great adventures since all his dreams have already come true in the boy's company—is explicitly stated in the lengthy text, which is in many ways similar to The Velveteen Rabbit (1922). The illustrations, which look hand-painted but were digitally created, are moderately sentimental with an impressionistic dreaminess (one illustration even includes a bunny-shaped cloud in the sky) and a warm glow throughout. The depiction of a teenage male openly displaying his emotions—hugging his beloved childhood toy for example—is refreshing. All human characters present as White expect for one of the boy’s friends who is Black.
A sweet, if oft-told, story. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-72825-448-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2022
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
