The fun shines through, although adult readers weary of metafiction related to books may opt out.
Dunlap’s picture-book debut starts on the jacket flap with a welcome and assurances that this is truly a no-nonsense title.
Tallec imagines the first-person narrator as a straight-laced, bow tie–wearing, bespectacled mouse; the rodent appears in the empty white space carrying a book and potted plant. As it reads quietly on recto, back facing the gutter, the head of a Word-Eating Flying Whale (identified in the very book the mouse is reading) enters stage left. The audience is encouraged to ignore this disturbance. When the mammal returns with a Glow-in-the-Dark Kung Fu Worm, the urge to follow tiny footprints across the now-charcoal pages proves irresistible to the beleaguered protagonist—if only to quell the excitement. The turning page reveals a psychedelic dance party, and all bets are off. Toe tapping and bottom shaking take over. The mouse justifies the title’s promise at the conclusion, pointing out that the book “was not fun for YOU. / I had a great time.” Tallec’s adroit caricatures and talent for building visual drama are a welcome pairing with the monologue voiced by the scholarly rodent. Will young listeners catch the humor in the mouse’s understated observation that the music has “plenty of notes and a fine, sturdy rhythm” while the orange, brown, green, and blue creatures bop with abandon?
The fun shines through, although adult readers weary of metafiction related to books may opt out. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: June 6, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-55061-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
Mixed-race children certainly deserve mirror books, but they also deserve excellent text and illustrations. This one misses...
This tan-skinned, freckle-faced narrator extols her own virtues while describing the challenges of being of mixed race.
Protagonist Lilly appears on the cover, and her voluminous curly, twirly hair fills the image. Throughout the rhyming narrative, accompanied by cartoonish digital illustrations, Lilly brags on her dark skin (that isn’t very), “frizzy, wild” hair, eyebrows, intellect, and more. Her five friends present black, Asian, white (one blonde, one redheaded), and brown (this last uses a wheelchair). This array smacks of tokenism, since the protagonist focuses only on self-promotion, leaving no room for the friends’ character development. Lilly describes how hurtful racial microaggressions can be by recalling questions others ask her like “What are you?” She remains resilient and says that even though her skin and hair make her different, “the way that I look / Is not all I’m about.” But she spends so much time talking about her appearance that this may be hard for readers to believe. The rhyming verse that conveys her self-celebration is often clumsy and forced, resulting in a poorly written, plotless story for which the internal illustrations fall far short of the quality of the cover image.
Mixed-race children certainly deserve mirror books, but they also deserve excellent text and illustrations. This one misses the mark on both counts. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Sept. 14, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-63233-170-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Eifrig
Review Posted Online: June 10, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
Fun, fun, fun all through the town!
This book’s gonna werk, werk, werk all through Pride Month and beyond.
Drag persona Lil Miss Hot Mess rewrites “The Wheels on the Bus” to create a fun, movement-filled, family-friendly celebration of drag. The text opens with the titular verse to establish the familiar song’s formulaic pattern: “The hips on the drag queen go SWISH, SWISH, SWISH… / ALL THROUGH THE TOWN!” Along the way, more and more drag queens join in the celebration. The unnamed queens proudly display a range of skin tones, sizes, and body modifications to create a diverse cast of realistic characters that could easily be spotted at a Pride event or on RuPaul’s Drag Race. The palette of both costumes and backgrounds is appropriately psychedelic, and there are plenty of jewels going “BLING, BLING, BLING.” Don’t tell the queens, but the flow is the book’s real star, because it encourages natural kinetic participation that will have groups of young readers giggling and miming along with the story. Libraries and bookshops hosting drag-queen storytimes will find this a popular choice, and those celebrating LGBTQ+ heritage will also find this a useful book for the pre-K crowd. Curious children unfamiliar with a drag queen may require a brief explanation, but the spectacle stands up just fine on its own platforms.
Fun, fun, fun all through the town! (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: May 5, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-7624-6765-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Running Press Kids
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
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