Jasper the Business Pig makes the sale with silliness and charm.
A proactive piglet seeks a new home and sense of belonging.
Jasper, “a gen-u-wine Business Pig,” feels out of place at the Sunshine Sanctuary for Farm Animals. Unlike his siblings, he hates playing in mud puddles and rooting about for food. The other animals don’t appreciate his flair for flow charts. Although the farm volunteers try to support Jasper, he longs for adoption. Not a pig “to let life get him down for long,” Jasper puts himself out there to find the perfect home. In this playful story about staying true to oneself, surprising and expressive illustrations wittily expand on the narration. The contrast between suit-and-tie–wearing Jasper and the other farm animals captures the lighthearted tone of the story. While his siblings walk on four legs and dig with their snouts, Jasper stands upright and uses a shovel. A white girl adopts Jasper at the end, but the volunteer who names him has dark brown skin and Afro-textured hair. Zuill’s use of varied perspectives and layouts creates movement and adds liveliness to the pacing of the text. Speech bubbles within the illustrations inject character voice into the story without interrupting the rhythm. With the easy flow of the narration and the light sense of humor, this picture book is well-suited for storytime.
Jasper the Business Pig makes the sale with silliness and charm. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4549-2684-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sterling
Review Posted Online: June 10, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
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
A good bet for the youngest bird-watchers.
Echoing the meter of “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” Ward uses catchy original rhymes to describe the variety of nests birds create.
Each sweet stanza is complemented by a factual, engaging description of the nesting habits of each bird. Some of the notes are intriguing, such as the fact that the hummingbird uses flexible spider web to construct its cup-shaped nest so the nest will stretch as the chicks grow. An especially endearing nesting behavior is that of the emperor penguin, who, with unbelievable patience, incubates the egg between his tummy and his feet for up to 60 days. The author clearly feels a mission to impart her extensive knowledge of birds and bird behavior to the very young, and she’s found an appealing and attractive way to accomplish this. The simple rhymes on the left page of each spread, written from the young bird’s perspective, will appeal to younger children, and the notes on the right-hand page of each spread provide more complex factual information that will help parents answer further questions and satisfy the curiosity of older children. Jenkins’ accomplished collage illustrations of common bird species—woodpecker, hummingbird, cowbird, emperor penguin, eagle, owl, wren—as well as exotics, such as flamingoes and hornbills, are characteristically naturalistic and accurate in detail.
A good bet for the youngest bird-watchers. (author’s note, further resources) (Informational picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 18, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4424-2116-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 3, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2014
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