KINZIE'S KINVENTIONS

In Boock’s children’s book, a young girl tries to discover her greatest talent.

Six-year-old Kinzie McMillan's class has a talent show coming up, and everyone has something to do for it—except her. Desperate to take home a trophy, she tries hard to find her own special skill with the help of her older sister, Sidney; her best friend, Cori; her mom and dad; and a magician on “ViewTube.” After reading an article about inventors in Whiz Kidz magazine, Kinzie uses an inventing process to look for her talent; the steps are “ask,” “imagine,” “plan,” “create,” “test,” and “improve.” Finally, the girl realizes that being an inventor can be a talent in itself. The question is, can she show other kids how they can invent things, too? Kinzie decides that recording a ViewTube video is the best way to teach other children. Kinzie begins by coming up with a problem that needs solving (“how to freshen your dog’s smelly breath”) and explains each step. When the invention initially fails, Kinzie is unperturbed, concluding that an integral part of the inventor’s process is Step 6: “improve.” She plays her video for the talent competition, and it’s a hit; fittingly, Kinzie wins an award for originality. Boock tells the story in Kinzie’s voice, making use of zesty slang, such as “abso-tootly!” and “shootie patootie!” which evokes the youngster’s delightful quirkiness and sense of humor. However, although the use of social media is handled delicately—Kinzie’s mom supervises her ViewTube usage—Kinzie essentially becomes just another ViewTuber by the end of the story (“I made my voice all loud and excited like the other ViewTubers do”), which seems to fly in the face of finding one’s individuality. Hider’s simple, grayscale cartoon images mostly focus on Kinzie, who has pale skin, glasses, and curly hair, and accurately reflect the events in the text as they happen.

A fun, if slightly uneven, never-give-up story for modern kids.