Ideal as a picture-book gift for graduating seniors, this also provides a beautiful lesson for its intended child audience.
It’s not the destination but the journey that matters for one sweetly chipper little chipmunk.
“Nature is a fickle thing. One wonders what mood she was in, the day she invented chipmunks.” From the start we are informed that upon reaching their seventh week of life, all chipmunks leave their mothers and set off into the wide world. So it is that Mino’s mama gives him a kiss and he boards a bus, taking with him several seeds and fairly humming with excitement. The bus ride is a long one, and Mino has time to befriend everyone who comes aboard, from the driver to the last passenger. After traveling and talking and sharing together, they reach the end of the line. The final two-page wordless spread simply shows that Mino's seeds, many of which he has given away to his fellow travelers, have sprouted into beautiful sunflowers. Lyrical language conveys how some passengers talk about big and small things: “And when a passenger reaches their stop and leaves, it’s the small things they shared that linger on in everyone’s hearts.” Endearing Mino will suck readers in with his excitement about the world; older readers about to embark on their own journeys, like soon-to-be or recent graduates, will especially relate to him, though so will youngsters. The art is an adorable array of penciled details and soft pastel colors. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Ideal as a picture-book gift for graduating seniors, this also provides a beautiful lesson for its intended child audience. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2023
ISBN: 9781838740887
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Flying Eye Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2023
Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back.
With such short arms, how can Tiny T. Rex give a sad friend a hug?
Fleck goes for cute in the simple, minimally detailed illustrations, drawing the diminutive theropod with a chubby turquoise body and little nubs for limbs under a massive, squared-off head. Impelled by the sight of stegosaurian buddy Pointy looking glum, little Tiny sets out to attempt the seemingly impossible, a comforting hug. Having made the rounds seeking advice—the dino’s pea-green dad recommends math; purple, New Age aunt offers cucumber juice (“That is disgusting”); red mom tells him that it’s OK not to be able to hug (“You are tiny, but your heart is big!”), and blue and yellow older sibs suggest practice—Tiny takes up the last as the most immediately useful notion. Unfortunately, the “tree” the little reptile tries to hug turns out to be a pterodactyl’s leg. “Now I am falling,” Tiny notes in the consistently self-referential narrative. “I should not have let go.” Fortunately, Tiny lands on Pointy’s head, and the proclamation that though Rexes’ hugs may be tiny, “I will do my very best because you are my very best friend” proves just the mood-lightening ticket. “Thank you, Tiny. That was the biggest hug ever.” Young audiences always find the “clueless grown-ups” trope a knee-slapper, the overall tone never turns preachy, and Tiny’s instinctive kindness definitely puts him at (gentle) odds with the dinky dino star of Bob Shea’s Dinosaur Vs. series.
Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: March 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4521-7033-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 11, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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