A well-crafted, immersive, interactive tale for children.
In this installment of the Dance-It-Out! series, Herbert intertwines a story of a helpful firefly with dance movements in a delightful tale for children.
The Silver Birch Forest animals begin gathering to celebrate the solstice. The highlight of the celebration is the “Firework Fliers, a squad of one hundred fireflies who would light up the sky in a dazzling, darting, dizzying kaleidoscope”; the grand finale determines who best captures the spirit of the season. Fenix, a firefly with short wings, dreams of being a Firework Flier, but realizes that is unlikely. His best friend, Bolt, is a Firework Flier, and Fenix is ready to cheer him on. Unfortunately, Bolt drinks too much nectar and gets a bellyache. Fenix decides to step in so the show won’t be spoiled. As Fenix climbs the tree to shine at the top, he encounters a bullfrog, a spider, and an owl, all offering to help Fenix—but they really want to help themselves to a firefly snack. He eludes them, and, with the Firework Fliers, he helps to create glowing animal shapes to enchant the forest animals, including snakes, rabbits, and, finally, fireflies, with Fenix shining brightly at the top. “Everyone agreed fireflies were the perfect Spirit of the Season.” The book, a creative blend of narrative and interactive participation, encourages children to act out the tale—each portion of the story is accompanied by dance movements, with descriptions and photographs of a ballerina executing each element of the choreography. The movements involve all parts of the body, with instructions such as “flap your raven wings in the breeze” and “swish and sway like a fish.” Partridge’s illustrations, in soft, glowing colors, enrich the story beautifully, and the text is rich with imagery (“The sun had cast long shadows across the field”). A lovely message is conveyed to readers: Everyone is important, and each of us, no matter how small, can play a key part in the things we do.
A well-crafted, immersive, interactive tale for children.Pub Date: March 1, 2024
ISBN: 9781955555821
Page Count: 38
Publisher: Once Upon A Dance
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift.
A paean to teachers and their surrogates everywhere.
This gentle ode to a teacher’s skill at inspiring, encouraging, and being a role model is spoken, presumably, from a child’s viewpoint. However, the voice could equally be that of an adult, because who can’t look back upon teachers or other early mentors who gave of themselves and offered their pupils so much? Indeed, some of the self-aware, self-assured expressions herein seem perhaps more realistic as uttered from one who’s already grown. Alternatively, readers won’t fail to note that this small book, illustrated with gentle soy-ink drawings and featuring an adult-child bear duo engaged in various sedentary and lively pursuits, could just as easily be about human parent- (or grandparent-) child pairs: some of the softly colored illustrations depict scenarios that are more likely to occur within a home and/or other family-oriented setting. Makes sense: aren’t parents and other close family members children’s first teachers? This duality suggests that the book might be best shared one-on-one between a nostalgic adult and a child who’s developed some self-confidence, having learned a thing or two from a parent, grandparent, older relative, or classroom instructor.
A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-943200-08-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Compendium
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among
Pete, the cat who couldn’t care less, celebrates Christmas with his inimitable lassitude.
If it weren’t part of the title and repeated on every other page, readers unfamiliar with Pete’s shtick might have a hard time arriving at “groovy” to describe his Christmas celebration, as the expressionless cat displays not a hint of groove in Dean’s now-trademark illustrations. Nor does Pete have a great sense of scansion: “On the first day of Christmas, / Pete gave to me… / A road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” The cat is shown at the wheel of a yellow microbus strung with garland and lights and with a star-topped tree tied to its roof. On the second day of Christmas Pete gives “me” (here depicted as a gray squirrel who gets on the bus) “2 fuzzy gloves, and a road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” On the third day, he gives “me” (now a white cat who joins Pete and the squirrel) “3 yummy cupcakes,” etc. The “me” mentioned in the lyrics changes from day to day and gift to gift, with “4 far-out surfboards” (a frog), “5 onion rings” (crocodile), and “6 skateboards rolling” (a yellow bird that shares its skateboards with the white cat, the squirrel, the frog, and the crocodile while Pete drives on). Gifts and animals pile on until the microbus finally arrives at the seaside and readers are told yet again that it’s all “GROOVY!”
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among . (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-267527-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
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