Readers will certainly agree that alligators do not belong at school, and parents, if they are far enough removed from them,...
Magnolia learns the hard way that an alligator is not a great item to bring for show and tell, and she wants readers to learn from her experience.
While Magnolia’s struggles with the alligator and his rambunctious behavior will be funny to kids, it’s adults who have dealt with similar behavior from their own young charges who will chuckle loudest. First, the alligator makes Magnolia laugh during spelling by showing her the funny picture he’s drawn. Her name goes on the board: last in line at lunch. She takes his crayons away. Then his origami paper airplane goes astray during art. The check next to Magnolia’s name means no recess. She takes away the paper. Some gum distracts him from eating a classmate...but makes a mess nonetheless—two more checks and an underline mean a trip to the principal’s office. Magnolia may be down, but she’s not out: she has a trick up her sleeve that just might turn her day around. Or not. Parsley’s digital illustrations are a riot, Magnolia’s smug expression gradually changing to chagrin, anger, and outright terror as the alligator continues his shenanigans, none worse than what a toddler dishes out on a regular basis.
Readers will certainly agree that alligators do not belong at school, and parents, if they are far enough removed from them, will fondly remember the days of their own children’s mischief. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: July 14, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-316-37657-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Oct. 5, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among
Pete, the cat who couldn’t care less, celebrates Christmas with his inimitable lassitude.
If it weren’t part of the title and repeated on every other page, readers unfamiliar with Pete’s shtick might have a hard time arriving at “groovy” to describe his Christmas celebration, as the expressionless cat displays not a hint of groove in Dean’s now-trademark illustrations. Nor does Pete have a great sense of scansion: “On the first day of Christmas, / Pete gave to me… / A road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” The cat is shown at the wheel of a yellow microbus strung with garland and lights and with a star-topped tree tied to its roof. On the second day of Christmas Pete gives “me” (here depicted as a gray squirrel who gets on the bus) “2 fuzzy gloves, and a road trip to the sea. / GROOVY!” On the third day, he gives “me” (now a white cat who joins Pete and the squirrel) “3 yummy cupcakes,” etc. The “me” mentioned in the lyrics changes from day to day and gift to gift, with “4 far-out surfboards” (a frog), “5 onion rings” (crocodile), and “6 skateboards rolling” (a yellow bird that shares its skateboards with the white cat, the squirrel, the frog, and the crocodile while Pete drives on). Gifts and animals pile on until the microbus finally arrives at the seaside and readers are told yet again that it’s all “GROOVY!”
Pete’s fans might find it groovy; anyone else has plenty of other “12 Days of Christmas” variants to choose among . (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-267527-9
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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