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KNOCK KNOCK

Name: KNOCK KNOCK
Author: Daniel Beaty
ISBN: 978-0-316-20917-5

MY DAD'S DREAM FOR ME

by Daniel Beaty ; illustrated by Bryan Collier ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 17, 2013

A valiant effort that falls short of its source’s fearless honesty and passion.

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A heartfelt effort to transform Beaty’s celebrated monologue into a picture book undermines the source material’s power, despite the contributions of Collier’s stunning collage-and-watercolor artwork.

A father and son play “KNOCK KNOCK” every morning, Papa knocking on the door to awaken him and the boy jumping into his arms. Both picture book and monologue open with this recollection and then reflect on the boy’s profound loss when his beloved father is suddenly gone; but while the latter text explains that this is due to the father’s incarceration, in picture-book form, his absence is unexplained until an author’s note in the backmatter. Not only is this potentially confusing and alarming, it also robs the text of one of its most powerful elements: when the boy visits his father in prison and must “KNOCK KNOCK” on the glass between them. In the monologue, Beaty says that he had to learn to father himself and give himself the words his father didn’t give to him. In this adaptation, the boy’s mysteriously absent father writes a loving letter filled with fatherly advice, but it omits the monologue’s lines about fighting poverty and racism and not allowing a father’s choices to define the child. Absent the critical back story, this picture book feels incomplete.

A valiant effort that falls short of its source’s fearless honesty and passion. (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: Dec. 17, 2013

ISBN: 978-0-316-20917-5

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: Oct. 19, 2013

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2013

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

- PERSPECTIVES
Bibliotherapy for All

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 21, 2016

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...

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Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.

The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.

While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)

Pub Date: June 21, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
ON THE FIRST DAY OF FIRST GRADE
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Sarah Jennings

- BOOK REVIEW
FIVE LITTLE BUNNIES
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Dan Yaccarino

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IMANI'S MOON

by JaNay Brown-Wood ; illustrated by Hazel Mitchell ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 14, 2014

While the blend of folklore, fantasy and realism is certainly far-fetched, Imani, with her winning personality, is a child...

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Imani endures the insults heaped upon her by the other village children, but she never gives up her dreams.

The Masai girl is tiny compared to the other children, but she is full of imagination and perseverance. Luckily, she has a mother who believes in her and tells her stories that will fuel that imagination. Mama tells her about the moon goddess, Olapa, who wins over the sun god. She tells Imani about Anansi, the trickster spider who vanquishes a larger snake. (Troublingly, the fact that Anansi is a West African figure, not of the Masai, goes unaddressed in both text and author’s note.) Inspired, the tiny girl tries to find new ways to achieve her dream: to touch the moon. One day, after crashing to the ground yet again when her leafy wings fail, she is ready to forget her hopes. That night, she witnesses the adumu, the special warriors’ jumping dance. Imani wakes the next morning, determined to jump to the moon. After jumping all day, she reaches the moon, meets Olapa and receives a special present from the goddess, a small moon rock. Now she becomes the storyteller when she relates her adventure to Mama. The watercolor-and-graphite illustrations have been enhanced digitally, and the night scenes of storytelling and fantasy with their glowing stars and moons have a more powerful impact than the daytime scenes, with their blander colors.

While the blend of folklore, fantasy and realism is certainly far-fetched, Imani, with her winning personality, is a child to be admired. (Picture book. 5-8)