Katz and Catrow continue their successful Silly Dilly Songs series with this collection of 15 parodies of familiar Christmas songs. The rewritten songs range from slightly silly to somewhat gross, but most provide the sort of irreverent humor beloved by children in elementary school. Highlights include “Snowball Fight” to the tune of “Jingle Bells,” “At the Malls” to the tune of “Deck the Halls” and “Where Did They Hide My Presents?” to the tune of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” The entry that seems destined to become a new schoolyard hit is “Something in My Brother’s Underpants,” (don’t ask) to the tune of “Winter Wonderland.” Catrow’s loose watercolor-and-ink illustrations add more humor to each song with splatting snowballs, quirky animals and big-eared kids with funny faces. Brave music teachers might want to try some of these new versions to liven up the annual holiday concert, and some parents might even introduce this as a unique diversion on the long drive over the river and through the woods to Grandmother’s house. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-689-86214-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: McElderry
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2005
This heavily earnest celebration of multi-ethnicity combines full-bleed paintings of smiling children, viewed through a golden haze dancing, playing, planting seedlings, and the like, with a hyperbolic, disconnected text—``Dark as leopard spots, light as sand,/Children buzz with laughter that kisses our land...''— printed in wavy lines. Literal-minded readers may have trouble with the author's premise, that ``Children come in all the colors of the earth and sky and sea'' (green? blue?), and most of the children here, though of diverse and mixed racial ancestry, wear shorts and T-shirts and seem to be about the same age. Hamanaka has chosen a worthy theme, but she develops it without the humor or imagination that animates her Screen of Frogs (1993). (Picture book. 5-7)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1994
ISBN: 0-688-11131-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1994
A touching, beautifully illustrated story of greatest interest to those in the New York City area.
A pair of cardinals is separated and then reunited when their tree home is moved to New York City to serve as the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree.
The male cardinal, Red, and his female partner, Lulu, enjoy their home in a huge evergreen tree located in the front yard of a small house in a pleasant neighborhood. When the tree is cut down and hauled away on a truck, Lulu is still inside the tree. Red follows the truck into the city but loses sight of it and gets lost. The birds are reunited when Red finds the tree transformed with colored lights and serving as the Christmas tree in a complex of city buildings. When the tree is removed after Christmas, the birds find a new home in a nearby park. Each following Christmas, the pair visit the new tree erected in the same location. Attractive illustrations effectively handle some difficult challenges of dimension and perspective and create a glowing, magical atmosphere for the snowy Christmas trees. The original owners of the tree are a multiracial family with two children; the father is African-American and the mother is white. The family is in the background in the early pages, reappearing again skating on the rink at Rockefeller Center with their tree in the background.
A touching, beautifully illustrated story of greatest interest to those in the New York City area. (author’s note) (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 19, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-7636-7733-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2017
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