A vivid, child’s-eye view of the world.
What does a child observe and experience in a day?
With brief, rhyming text and labeled illustrations, this picture book is jam-packed with detail. Each spread takes on a different topic, like what readers might see on a walk, in the water, or in the sky. Some of the descriptive labels apply literally—a plant, a bunny, a bird. Others are more abstract—the word luck is placed near a penny and a four-leaf clover; the word thief, near a sneaky squirrel. The pages are set against a solid black background, giving the colorful items a neon, glowing effect. At the start, a little white adult-child mouse pair can be seen scurrying off the page. They appear throughout, flying in the sky on one page; on the spread devoted to the water, the little one even appears to grow a mermaidlike tail. At the end, home once again, the parent mouse tucks the little one into bed. The mice’s activities, which may not be obvious to readers at first, add an enchanting Where’s Waldo? effect. Little ones will enjoy lingering with every reread, finding new details. The book is grounded in a child’s perspective, centering on things that will interest them—noticing things on the ground, looking at how small things look in the sky, and replaying a busy day’s events in dreams. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A vivid, child’s-eye view of the world. (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: May 16, 2023
ISBN: 9781419758942
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Abrams Appleseed
Review Posted Online: Feb. 7, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2023
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own...
The sturdy Little Blue Truck is back for his third adventure, this time delivering Christmas trees to his band of animal pals.
The truck is decked out for the season with a Christmas wreath that suggests a nose between headlights acting as eyeballs. Little Blue loads up with trees at Toad’s Trees, where five trees are marked with numbered tags. These five trees are counted and arithmetically manipulated in various ways throughout the rhyming story as they are dropped off one by one to Little Blue’s friends. The final tree is reserved for the truck’s own use at his garage home, where he is welcomed back by the tree salestoad in a neatly circular fashion. The last tree is already decorated, and Little Blue gets a surprise along with readers, as tiny lights embedded in the illustrations sparkle for a few seconds when the last page is turned. Though it’s a gimmick, it’s a pleasant surprise, and it fits with the retro atmosphere of the snowy country scenes. The short, rhyming text is accented with colored highlights, red for the animal sounds and bright green for the numerical words in the Christmas-tree countdown.
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own tree that will put a twinkle in a toddler’s eyes. (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-544-32041-3
Page Count: 24
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2014
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Innovative and thoroughly enjoyable.
You think you know shapes? Animals? Blend them together, and you might see them both a little differently!
What a mischievous twist on a concept book! With wordplay and a few groan-inducing puns, Neal creates connections among animals and shapes that are both unexpected and so seemingly obvious that readers might wonder why they didn’t see them all along. Of course, a “lazy turtle” meeting an oval would create the side-splitting combo of a “SLOW-VAL.” A dramatic page turn transforms a deeply saturated, clean-lined green oval by superimposing a head and turtle shell atop, with watery blue ripples completing the illusion. Minimal backgrounds and sketchy, impressionistic detailing keep the focus right on the zany animals. Beginning with simple shapes, the geometric forms become more complicated as the book advances, taking readers from a “soaring bird” that meets a triangle to become a “FLY-ANGLE” to a “sleepy lion” nonagon “YAWN-AGON.” Its companion text, Animal Colors, delves into color theory, this time creating entirely hybrid animals, such as the “GREEN WHION” with maned head and whale’s tail made from a “blue whale and a yellow lion.” It’s a compelling way to visualize color mixing, and like Animal Shapes, it’s got verve. Who doesn’t want to shout out that a yellow kangaroo/green moose blend is a “CHARTREUSE KANGAMOOSE”?
Innovative and thoroughly enjoyable. (Board book. 2-4)Pub Date: March 27, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4998-0534-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Little Bee Books
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
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