A hungry wolf just can’t catch a break in these five loosely connected folktales. All are familiar, and amiably retold in large, sequential cartoon panels. Looking dapper in top hat and three-piece suit, the wolf first takes on three pigs (all of whom escape), moves on to the bored and foolish lad who cries “Wolf!” then is subjected to a fashion smackdown by Little Red Riding Hood. He unsuccessfully tries his luck again with the sheep under a woolen fleece snatched from Grandma’s house, and finally proves no match for seven hyperactive goslings whose mother has gone off on an errand. Readers drawn by the unusually large trim size and Alley’s animated, loosely posed figures will linger over the snappy dialogue (“ ‘I’ll teach you to be rude to my granny, you fake!’ screamed Rhonda, now clearly upset. ‘And did no one ever tell you not to wear white after Labor Day?’ ”) and almost feel sorry for the feckless predator—who is last seen eyeing a sign pointing toward Mr. McGregor’s garden and considering turning vegetarian. (Graphic folklore. 7-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-59643-275-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Neal Porter/Roaring Brook
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
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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