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
A friendship tale with solid messaging and plenty of fun sounds to share.
In this latest in the series, Little Blue Truck, driven by pal Toad, is challenged to a countryside race by Racer Red, a sleek, low-slung vehicle.
Blue agrees, and the race is on. Although the two start off “hood to hood / and wheel to wheel,” they switch positions often as they speed their way over dusty country roads. Blue’s farm friends follow along to share in the excitement and shout out encouragement; adult readers will have fun voicing the various animal sounds. Short rhyming verses on each page and several strategic page turns add drama to the narrative, but soft, mottled effects in the otherwise colorful illustrations keep the competition from becoming too intense. Racer Red crosses the finish line first, but Blue is a gracious loser, happy to have worked hard. That’s a new concept for Racer Red, who’s laser-focused on victory but takes Blue’s words (“win or lose, it’s fun to try!”) to heart—a revelation that may lead to worthwhile storytime discussions. When Blue’s farm animal friends hop into the truck for the ride home, Racer Red tags along and learns a second lesson, one about speed. “Fast is fun, / and slow is too, / as long as you’re / with friends.”
A friendship tale with solid messaging and plenty of fun sounds to share. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 25, 2025
ISBN: 9780063387843
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Jan. 18, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2025
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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
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