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SWIM, DUCK, SWIM!

Name: SWIM, DUCK, SWIM!
Author: Susan Lurie
ISBN: 978-1-250-04642-0

by Susan Lurie ; photographed by Murray Head ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 20, 2014

A childhood triumph portrayed just right. Both the archetypal challenge and the creative collaboration go swimmingly.

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Standing in for any reluctant preschooler faced with a new experience, a duckling goes through stages of irritation at parental urging and then nervousness before finally taking a first plunge.

Duckling has no trouble with self-expression: “I told you once. I told you twice. / I don’t like to get wet.” His feelings are reflected with astonishing veracity in Head’s (Frisky Brisky Hippety Hop, 2012) sunlit, close-up color photos. Taken in New York City’s Central Park, the full-bleed pond-side scenes mostly feature a pair of adult mallards attending to a fuzzy hatchling who really looks angry, stubborn, pensive, apprehensive and, at last, gleeful thanks to an artful eye and clever angles of view. Lurie’s rhymed monologue reads with a natural rather than singsong cadence and is set out on each spread in a few lines or partial lines that match the accompanying picture wonderfully well. “I’m in the pond! Look at me! / Hooray! I’m not afraid!”

A childhood triumph portrayed just right. Both the archetypal challenge and the creative collaboration go swimmingly. (Picture book. 3-5)

Pub Date: May 20, 2014

ISBN: 978-1-250-04642-0

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Feiwel & Friends

Review Posted Online: March 2, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2014

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS

- BOOK REVIEW
WANDA SEASONGOOD AND THE ALMOST PERFECT LIE
by Susan Lurie ; illustrated by Jenn Harney

- BOOK REVIEW
WANDA SEASONGOOD AND THE MOSTLY TRUE SECRET
by Susan Lurie ; illustrated by Jenn Harney

- BOOK REVIEW
FRISKY BRISKY HIPPITY HOP
by Alexina B. White & Susan Lurie & photographed by Murray Head

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WILL YOU BE MY FRIEND?

by Sam McBratney ; illustrated by Anita Jeram ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 29, 2020

Readers are likely to love it to the moon and back.

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Little Nutbrown Hare ventures out into the wide world and comes back with a new companion in this sequel to Guess How Much I Love You (1994).

Big Nutbrown Hare is too busy, so after asking permission, Little Nutbrown Hare scampers off over the rolling meadow to play by himself. After discovering that neither his shadow nor his reflection make satisfactory playmates (“You’re only another me!”), Little Nutbrown comes to Cloudy Mountain…and meets “Someone real!” It’s a white bunny who introduces herself as Tipps. But a wonderful round of digging and building and chasing about reaches an unexpected end with a game of hide-and-seek, because both hares hide! After waiting a long time to be found, Little Nutbrown Hare hops on home in disappointment, wondering whether he’ll ever see Tipps again. As it turns out, it doesn’t take long to find out, since she has followed him. “Now, where on earth did she come from?” wonders Big Nutbrown. “Her name is Tipps,” Little Nutbrown proudly replies, “and she’s my friend.” Jeram’s spacious, pale-toned, naturalistic outdoor scenes create a properly idyllic setting for this cozy development in a tender child-caregiver relationship—which hasn’t lost a bit of its appealing intimacy in the more than 25 years since its first appearance. As in the first, Big Nutbrown Hare is ungendered, facilitating pleasingly flexible readings.

Readers are likely to love it to the moon and back. (Picture book. 3-5)

Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-5362-1747-6

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Candlewick

Review Posted Online: June 29, 2020

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS

- BOOK REVIEW
MINDI AND THE GOOSE NO ONE ELSE COULD SEE
by Sam McBratney ; illustrated by Linda Ólafsdóttir

- BOOK REVIEW
ONE MORE TICKLE!
by Sam McBratney ; illustrated by Anita Jeram

- BOOK REVIEW
LOOK WHAT I CAN DO
by Sam McBratney ; illustrated by Anita Jeram

- IN THE NEWS
Children’s Author Sam McBratney Dies at 77

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I NEED A HUG

by Aaron Blabey ; illustrated by Aaron Blabey ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 29, 2019

This is a tremendously moving story, but some people will be moved only on the second reading, after they’ve Googled “How to...

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A hug shouldn’t require an instruction manual—but some do.

A porcupine can frighten even the largest animal. In this picture book, a bear and a deer, along with a small rabbit, each run away when they hear eight simple words and their name: “I need a hug. Will you cuddle me,…?” As they flee, each utters a definitive refusal that rhymes with their name. The repetitive structure gives Blabey plenty of opportunities for humor, because every animal responds to the question with an outlandish, pop-eyed expression of panic. But the understated moments are even funnier. Each animal takes a moment to think over the request, and the drawings are nuanced enough that readers can see the creatures react with slowly building anxiety or, sometimes, a glassy stare. These silent reaction shots not only show exquisite comic timing, but they make the rhymes in the text feel pleasingly subtle by delaying the final line in each stanza. The story is a sort of fable about tolerance. It turns out that a porcupine can give a perfectly adequate hug when its quills are flat and relaxed, but no one stays around long enough to find out except for an animal that has its own experiences with intolerance: a snake. It’s an apt, touching moral, but the climax may confuse some readers as they try to figure out the precise mechanics of the embrace.

This is a tremendously moving story, but some people will be moved only on the second reading, after they’ve Googled “How to pet a porcupine.” (Picture book. 3-5)