Despite its good intentions, readers may find Bill’s message of individuality and acceptance lost in the catalogue of...
An interactive and funky text transmits the message that it’s OK to just be yourself.
Eager to prove he’s not just another fish in the sea, Bill the Fish likes to say that he is “happy being me” and begins by highlighting his quirky habits, like eating breakfast for dinner and enjoying painting with his snail friend, Fred. Bill’s habits and characteristics are then contrasted with a motley crew of his fellow sea creatures, which range from a prawn with a beard to a stylish jellyfish called Kelly. The text features an easy-to-follow narrator whose clipped British accent adds to the silliness of the short and simple rhyming text. Unfortunately for those who chose to follow along with the printed text or read to themselves, the type used presents a confusing and inconsistent mix of upper- and lower-case letters. Interactive elements include zany sound effects (some of which make sense, while others don't), animated characters that are activated by tapping and a few characters that can be “dressed — up” by dragging and dropping elements like hats and beards. Bright, colorful painted illustrations pair well with the text, but renditions of the characters vary in quality, providing a sense of inconsistency that can be distracting.
Despite its good intentions, readers may find Bill’s message of individuality and acceptance lost in the catalogue of characteristics. (iPad storybook app. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2012
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Interact Media
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
As ephemeral as a valentine.
Daywalt and Jeffers’ wandering crayons explore love.
Each double-page spread offers readers a vision of one of the anthropomorphic crayons on the left along with the statement “Love is [color].” The word love is represented by a small heart in the appropriate color. Opposite, childlike crayon drawings explain how that color represents love. So, readers learn, “love is green. / Because love is helpful.” The accompanying crayon drawing depicts two alligators, one holding a recycling bin and the other tossing a plastic cup into it, offering readers two ways of understanding green. Some statements are thought-provoking: “Love is white. / Because sometimes love is hard to see,” reaches beyond the immediate image of a cat’s yellow eyes, pink nose, and black mouth and whiskers, its white face and body indistinguishable from the paper it’s drawn on, to prompt real questions. “Love is brown. / Because sometimes love stinks,” on the other hand, depicted by a brown bear standing next to a brown, squiggly turd, may provoke giggles but is fundamentally a cheap laugh. Some of the color assignments have a distinctly arbitrary feel: Why is purple associated with the imagination and pink with silliness? Fans of The Day the Crayons Quit (2013) hoping for more clever, metaliterary fun will be disappointed by this rather syrupy read.
As ephemeral as a valentine. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Dec. 24, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5247-9268-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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