A painful, comic retelling of five horror movies. Wisniewski is so familiar with these films that the inside jokes must be hilariously funny to him. However, it’s hard to imagine the young reader who has seen, or even heard of, the original movies and therefore hard to imagine them understanding the jokes. Though much of the humor is calculated to bring a groan rather than a guffaw, it’s hard to see how the intended audience will respond with anything but a blank look. The werewolf with a feminine haircut becomes a werewuss; a crazed hermit runs around insulting everyone in German; the castle has a big buttress and is dieting to lose it; space aliens in the form of toupees take over the mind of General Malaise and space girdles threaten to take their place. Some of the characters are stereotypic, if not downright racist: “More chins than a Chinese phone book,” the Tibetan guide, Duk Pin Bo Ling, and the Abominable Showman, who sounds like a stereotyped character in a bad Catskills production. Because many authors are trying to hop on Pilkey’s Captain Underpants bandwagon, the confused young readers will pick up this inviting-looking volume, with its hilarious illustrations, readable font, and comfortable white space and shake their heads in confusion. If the stories were not devoid of plot, older readers might like figuring out the puns and plays on words. (Fiction. 7-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-06-000513-0
Page Count: 80
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2002
Trickling, bubbling, swirling, rushing, a river flows down from its mountain beginnings, past peaceful country and bustling city on its way to the sea. Hooper (The Drop in My Drink, 1998, etc.) artfully evokes the water’s changing character as it transforms from “milky-cold / rattling-bold” to a wide, slow “sliding past mudflats / looping through marshes” to the end of its journey. Willey, best known for illustrating Geraldine McCaughrean’s spectacular folk-tale collections, contributes finely detailed scenes crafted in shimmering, intricate blues and greens, capturing mountain’s chill, the bucolic serenity of passing pastures, and a sense of mystery in the water’s shadowy depths. Though Hooper refers to “the cans and cartons / and bits of old wood” being swept along, there’s no direct conservation agenda here (for that, see Debby Atwell’s River, 1999), just appreciation for the river’s beauty and being. (Picture book/nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: June 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0792-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2000
Alert readers will find the implicit morals: know your audience, mostly, but also never underestimate the power of “rock”...
The theme of persistence (for better or worse) links four tales of magic, trickery, and near disasters.
Lachenmeyer freely borrows familiar folkloric elements, subjecting them to mildly comical twists. In the nearly wordless “Hip Hop Wish,” a frog inadvertently rubs a magic lamp and finds itself saddled with an importunate genie eager to shower it with inappropriate goods and riches. In the title tale, an increasingly annoyed music-hating witch transforms a persistent minstrel into a still-warbling cow, horse, sheep, goat, pig, duck, and rock in succession—then is horrified to catch herself humming a tune. Athesius the sorcerer outwits Warthius, a rival trying to steal his spells via a parrot, by casting silly ones in Ig-pay Atin-lay in the third episode, and in the finale, a painter’s repeated efforts to create a flattering portrait of an ogre king nearly get him thrown into a dungeon…until he suddenly understands what an ogre’s idea of “flattering” might be. The narratives, dialogue, and sound effects leave plenty of elbow room in Blocker’s big, brightly colored panels for the expressive animal and human(ish) figures—most of the latter being light skinned except for the golden genie, the blue ogre, and several people of color in the “Sorcerer’s New Pet.”
Alert readers will find the implicit morals: know your audience, mostly, but also never underestimate the power of “rock” music. (Graphic short stories. 8-10)Pub Date: June 18, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-59643-750-0
Page Count: 112
Publisher: First Second
Review Posted Online: April 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2019
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