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GO, SHAPES, GO!

Name: GO, SHAPES, GO!
Author: Denise Fleming
ISBN: 978-1-4424-8240-1

by Denise Fleming ; illustrated by Denise Fleming ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 7, 2014

The title will surely inspire children to create and deconstruct their own geometric dramas.

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Fleming’s signature pulp-painted backgrounds set the stage for a performance featuring an assemblage of shapes; created from patterned handmade papers, the forms are choreographed in their activity by a madcap mouse on wheels.

“Slide, SQUARE, and start the show!” he cries, zooming around the double-page spreads. The labeled shapes, from “small ovals” to “thin rectangles,” cross each gutter from verso to recto as the pages turn, until the contours of a creature are discernable. Children will enjoy predicting at various points in the narrative; a monkey would be the correct guess for the first animal. Motion lines drawn with pastels combine with expressive verbs, rhyming couplets and playful phrases to animate the narrative: “Bibbity bop!” Although Fleming presents a veritable smorgasbord of early learning (shapes, colors, directions and concepts), there is also a dramatic arc with tension and humor. When the mouse careens into the loosely placed papers, they scatter and re-form—into a cat! The denouement is a bit untidy, leaving readers with inquiring minds questioning what happens to the feline, after a page turn reveals a new monkey made with different paper, but they will feel relief that all’s well that ends well.

The title will surely inspire children to create and deconstruct their own geometric dramas. (Picture book. 2-6)

Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2014

ISBN: 978-1-4424-8240-1

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: July 15, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2014

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS

- BOOK REVIEW
THIS IS THE NEST THAT ROBIN BUILT
by Denise Fleming ; illustrated by Denise Fleming

- BOOK REVIEW
5 LITTLE DUCKS
by Denise Fleming ; illustrated by Denise Fleming

- BOOK REVIEW
MAGGIE AND MICHAEL GET DRESSED
by Denise Fleming ; illustrated by Denise Fleming

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LITTLE BLUE TRUCK'S CHRISTMAS

by Alice Schertle ; illustrated by Jill McElmurry ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 23, 2014

Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own...

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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

Categories:

CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS | CHILDREN'S HOLIDAYS & CELEBRATIONS | CHILDREN'S TRANSPORTATION

- BOOK REVIEW
LITTLE BLUE TRUCK MAKES A FRIEND
by Alice Schertle ; illustrated by Jill McElmurry

- BOOK REVIEW
TIME FOR SCHOOL, LITTLE BLUE TRUCK
by Alice Schertle ; illustrated by John Joseph

- BOOK REVIEW
LITTLE BLUE TRUCK'S VALENTINE
by Alice Schertle ; illustrated by John Joseph

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LOVE FROM THE CRAYONS

by Drew Daywalt ; illustrated by Oliver Jeffers ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 24, 2019

As ephemeral as a valentine.

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Daywalt and Jeffers’ wandering crayons explore love.

Each double-page spread offers readers a vision of one of the anthropomorphic crayons on the left along with the statement “Love is [color].” The word love is represented by a small heart in the appropriate color. Opposite, childlike crayon drawings explain how that color represents love. So, readers learn, “love is green. / Because love is helpful.” The accompanying crayon drawing depicts two alligators, one holding a recycling bin and the other tossing a plastic cup into it, offering readers two ways of understanding green. Some statements are thought-provoking: “Love is white. / Because sometimes love is hard to see,” reaches beyond the immediate image of a cat’s yellow eyes, pink nose, and black mouth and whiskers, its white face and body indistinguishable from the paper it’s drawn on, to prompt real questions. “Love is brown. / Because sometimes love stinks,” on the other hand, depicted by a brown bear standing next to a brown, squiggly turd, may provoke giggles but is fundamentally a cheap laugh. Some of the color assignments have a distinctly arbitrary feel: Why is purple associated with the imagination and pink with silliness? Fans of The Day the Crayons Quit (2013) hoping for more clever, metaliterary fun will be disappointed by this rather syrupy read.

As ephemeral as a valentine. (Picture book. 4-6)