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JEAN LAFFITE AND THE BIG OL’ WHALE

Name: JEAN LAFFITE AND THE BIG OL’ WHALE
Author: Frank G. Fox
ISBN: 0-374-33669-5

by Frank G. Fox & illustrated by Scott Cook ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 3, 2003

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There are plenty of old, larger-than-life characters who are more closely associated with the Mississippi River than Jean Lafitte and are being forgotten as the years slip into the mists of time. The legendary Mike Fink, Bob Hooker, and even James Eads, who opened the South pass of the America’s Great River, deserve to be remembered. So why Fox, in his debut for children, decided to hoist Lafitte onto the level of John Bunyan and other tall-tale heroes is a mystery. Eschewing Lafitte’s French roots and his membership in a Privateer pre-mafia, Fox concocts a brand-new character with a familiar name (spelled differently) who, in the best tradition of remarkable legends, is able to walk and swim almost immediately. When a whale swims upriver from the Gulf of Mexico and blocks all water coming down, Laffite comes up with an ingenious way to move the whale and turn the tide. And in true big-country-hero style, he finishes by digging a huge lake (Ponchartrain), thinly because the whale would have someplace to go if he returns rather than providing the people with an alternative if the river were blocked again. Cook’s (Lapin Plays Possum, 2002, etc.) illustrations, usually fun and right on for southern fables, come up soggy in this outing, perhaps because the whale is too cute or because Cook’s loose style doesn’t suit the shadings and odd perspectives needed to paint this tall tale grandly. The story is told in good fun and well enough for the unwashed, but muddies the history and myth of a river that has forgotten more interesting lore than this. (Picture book. 4-7)

Pub Date: April 3, 2003

ISBN: 0-374-33669-5

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2003

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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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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TINY T. REX AND THE IMPOSSIBLE HUG

by Jonathan Stutzman ; illustrated by Jay Fleck ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 5, 2019

Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back.

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With such short arms, how can Tiny T. Rex give a sad friend a hug?

Fleck goes for cute in the simple, minimally detailed illustrations, drawing the diminutive theropod with a chubby turquoise body and little nubs for limbs under a massive, squared-off head. Impelled by the sight of stegosaurian buddy Pointy looking glum, little Tiny sets out to attempt the seemingly impossible, a comforting hug. Having made the rounds seeking advice—the dino’s pea-green dad recommends math; purple, New Age aunt offers cucumber juice (“That is disgusting”); red mom tells him that it’s OK not to be able to hug (“You are tiny, but your heart is big!”), and blue and yellow older sibs suggest practice—Tiny takes up the last as the most immediately useful notion. Unfortunately, the “tree” the little reptile tries to hug turns out to be a pterodactyl’s leg. “Now I am falling,” Tiny notes in the consistently self-referential narrative. “I should not have let go.” Fortunately, Tiny lands on Pointy’s head, and the proclamation that though Rexes’ hugs may be tiny, “I will do my very best because you are my very best friend” proves just the mood-lightening ticket. “Thank you, Tiny. That was the biggest hug ever.” Young audiences always find the “clueless grown-ups” trope a knee-slapper, the overall tone never turns preachy, and Tiny’s instinctive kindness definitely puts him at (gentle) odds with the dinky dino star of Bob Shea’s Dinosaur Vs. series.

Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back. (Picture book. 5-7)