A witty, wordless (in a sense) Christmas Eve tale from a New Yorker artist, featuring an indefatigably yippy small dog who goes positively ballistic when Santa drops down the chimney. To the dog’s intense frustration, however, Santa is invisible to all the sleepy folk roused by the commotion. The simply drawn figures are set within cartoon boxes, with only pale tan fill and red highlights for color, but literally hundreds of hand-lettered “woofs” and “grrrs” for decoration—not so much text as motif, impossible to actually read. Turner serves up a surprise at the end: not only does the palette change to Christmas colors, but before being sent packing by a cat’s “Sssshhhhh!,” the pup scores a patch from the seat of Santa’s pants—and an actual patch of red felt is glued to the final page. Grownups will chuckle; children would probably like this more as an animated film. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-84156-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2001
Having put together a band with renowned cousin Duck Ellington and singer “Bee” Holiday, Rooster’s chances sure look...
Winning actually isn’t everything, as jazz-happy Rooster learns when he goes up against the legendary likes of Mules Davis and Ella Finchgerald at the barnyard talent show.
Having put together a band with renowned cousin Duck Ellington and singer “Bee” Holiday, Rooster’s chances sure look good—particularly after his “ ‘Hen from Ipanema’ [makes] / the barnyard chickies swoon.”—but in the end the competition is just too stiff. No matter: A compliment from cool Mules and the conviction that he still has the world’s best band soon puts the strut back in his stride. Alexander’s versifying isn’t always in tune (“So, he went to see his cousin, / a pianist of great fame…”), and despite his moniker Rooster plays an electric bass in Bower’s canted country scenes. Children are unlikely to get most of the jokes liberally sprinkled through the text, of course, so the adults sharing it with them should be ready to consult the backmatter, which consists of closing notes on jazz’s instruments, history and best-known musicians.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-58536-688-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2011
Strong rhythms and occasional full or partial rhymes give this account of P.T. Barnum’s 1884 elephant parade across the newly opened Brooklyn Bridge an incantatory tone. Catching a whiff of public concern about the new bridge’s sturdiness, Barnum seizes the moment: “’I will stage an event / that will calm every fear, erase every worry, / about that remarkable bridge. / My display will amuse, inform / and astound some. / Or else my name isn’t Barnum!’” Using a rich palette of glowing golds and browns, Roca imbues the pachyderms with a calm solidity, sending them ambling past equally solid-looking buildings and over a truly monumental bridge—which soars over a striped Big Top tent in the final scene. A stately rendition of the episode, less exuberant, but also less fictionalized, than Phil Bildner’s Twenty-One Elephants (2004), illustrated by LeUyen Pham. (author’s note, resource list) (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2005
ISBN: 0-618-44887-X
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2005
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