Overwhelming sweetness with underwhelming diversity.
Four reimagined fairy tales each provide a different example of what it means to be brave.
Gentle Jack the giant lives a peaceful life with his beloved mother until a diminutive thief, also named Jack, from another land breaks into his home. Puzzle-loving Hansel and his daring sister face the dangers of the dark woods together when their aunt and uncle abandon them. Christian, a former shepherd boy, risks his life to tell the truth when swindlers take advantage of the emperor’s vanity. Despite doubts about his destiny, Prince Leo Charming battles an evil fairy to break a curse. As the verse preface suggests, each of the boy protagonists displays internal strengths unrelated to their size or physical prowess to overcome a trial. Every hero earns a happily-ever-after by learning an undisguised lesson. Some of the tales make an effort to challenge gender stereotypes by including girls with physical strength and athletic abilities, but they never expand beyond a binary depiction of gender. The last story, a new version of “Sleeping Beauty,” removes the kiss between the prince and the princess. Instead, Aurora’s mother models consent by asking Prince Leo if she may kiss him in thanks for saving their whole kingdom. Illustrations in a green palette accompany the text. Apart from in “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” in which the illustrations seem to depict an Asian setting, all of the characters seem to be White.
Overwhelming sweetness with underwhelming diversity. (Fantasy. 6-10)Pub Date: Oct. 27, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-7359-1
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A kind child in a book for middle-grade readers? There’s no downside to that.
Beatrice Zinker is a kinder, gentler Judy Moody.
Beatrice doesn’t want to be fit in a box. Her first word was “WOW,” not “Mom.” She does her best thinking upside down and prefers to dress like a ninja. Like Judy Moody, she has patient parents and a somewhat annoying younger brother. (She also has a perfectly ordinary older sister.) Beatrice spends all summer planning a top-secret spy operation complete with secret codes and a secret language (pig Latin). But on the first day of third grade, her best friend, Lenny (short for Eleanor), shows up in a dress, with a new friend who wants to play veterinarian at recess. Beatrice, essentially a kind if somewhat quirky kid, struggles to see the upside of the situation and ends up with two friends instead of one. Line drawings on almost every spread add to the humor and make the book accessible to readers who might otherwise balk at its 160 pages. Thankfully, the rhymes in the text do not continue past the first chapter. Children will enjoy the frequent puns and Beatrice’s preference for climbing trees and hanging upside down. The story drifts dangerously close to pedantry when Beatrice asks for advice from a grandmotherly neighbor but is saved by likable characters and upside-down cake. Beatrice seems to be white; Lenny’s surname, Santos, suggests that she may be Latina; their school is a diverse one.
A kind child in a book for middle-grade readers? There’s no downside to that. (Fiction. 6-10)Pub Date: Sept. 19, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4847-6738-2
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2017
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists.
How to raise money for a coveted poster: put your friends to work!
John, founder of the FUBU fashion line and a Shark Tank venture capitalist, offers a self-referential blueprint for financial success. Having only half of the $10 he needs for a Minka J poster, Daymond forks over $1 to buy a plain T-shirt, paints a picture of the pop star on it, sells it for $5, and uses all of his cash to buy nine more shirts. Then he recruits three friends to decorate them with his design and help sell them for an unspecified amount (from a conveniently free and empty street-fair booth) until they’re gone. The enterprising entrepreneur reimburses himself for the shirts and splits the remaining proceeds, which leaves him with enough for that poster as well as a “brand-new business book,” while his friends express other fiscal strategies: saving their share, spending it all on new art supplies, or donating part and buying a (math) book with the rest. (In a closing summation, the author also suggests investing in stocks, bonds, or cryptocurrency.) Though Miles cranks up the visual energy in her sparsely detailed illustrations by incorporating bright colors and lots of greenbacks, the actual advice feels a bit vague. Daymond is Black; most of the cast are people of color. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists. (Picture book. 7-9)Pub Date: March 21, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-56727-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
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