A sweet, playful bedtime story with animal appeal.
A young child’s imagination runs wild before bedtime.
It’s lights out, but energetic Sweet Pea, depicted with light-brown skin and straight hair, isn’t quite ready to go to sleep yet. Mama, a stout White woman, repeatedly tries to tuck them in, but they obstruct her attempts by chattering on about all the various ways they could sleep. Climbing up a bedpost, they declare that they want to sleep like koalas do, high up in trees. Hiding under their pillow, they pretend that they are dozing like a puffin in its burrow. Standing on their bed, they wonder if they can sleep upright like emperor penguins snoozing on rocks. After making their way through several more animals and their sleeping habits, Sweet Pea's stalling ends as they conclude that their bed is “the best bed for me.” Cornwall’s art, rendered in pencil and watercolor with a digital finish, uses a restrained palette of minimal, muted colors that adds a soporific feel to the narrative. The text is dialogue-heavy but flows easily and combines the humor of Sweet Pea’s bedtime antics with the tenderness of their relationship with their patient caregivers. The illustrations show that Sweet Pea has two moms, one of whom shares their skin color and hair color.
A sweet, playful bedtime story with animal appeal. (Picture book. 5-9)Pub Date: May 17, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5362-0715-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2022
This outing lacks the sophistication of such category standards as Clementine; here’s hoping English amps things up for...
A gentle voice and familiar pitfalls characterize this tale of a boy navigating the risky road to responsibility.
Gavin is new to his neighborhood and Carver Elementary. He likes his new friend, Richard, and has a typically contentious relationship with his older sister, Danielle. When Gavin’s desire to impress Richard sets off a disastrous chain of events, the boy struggles to evade responsibility for his actions. “After all, it isn’t his fault that Danielle’s snow globe got broken. Sure, he shouldn’t have been in her room—but then, she shouldn’t be keeping candy in her room to tempt him. Anybody would be tempted. Anybody!” opines Gavin once he learns the punishment for his crime. While Gavin has a charming Everyboy quality, and his aversion to Aunt Myrtle’s yapping little dog rings true, little about Gavin distinguishes him from other trouble-prone protagonists. He is, regrettably, forgettable. Coretta Scott King Honor winner English (Francie, 1999) is a teacher whose storytelling usually benefits from her day job. Unfortunately, the pizzazz of classroom chaos is largely absent from this series opener.
This outing lacks the sophistication of such category standards as Clementine; here’s hoping English amps things up for subsequent volumes. (Fiction. 6-9)Pub Date: Dec. 17, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-547-97044-8
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A charming friendship story and great setup for future books.
Curious about the Big Wide World outside his Sasquatch community, Hugo makes a friend who is of it.
Sasquatch Hugo’s bedroom is inside a cave and possesses the charming feature of a small stream running through it that he can sail his little toy boat on. It’s cool, but he yearns to see the Big Wide World. When he asks his smart friend Gigi if a Sasquatch might become a sailor, she says it’s possible but would be difficult—the primary rule of their people is to not be seen by Humans. Then, in everyone’s favorite Hide and Go Sneak class, which is held outside, a Human appears; Hugo laughs at the sight, drawing Human attention in a taboo-breaking mistake. Shortly after, Hugo’s toy boat floats into the cave with a Human toy—soon, it’s facilitating a pen-pal–type relationship that’s derailed when Hugo confesses to being a Sasquatch and Human Boone, a budding cryptozoologist, doesn’t believe him. How Hugo and Boone resolve this misapprehension and become friends in a joint search for the Ogopogo concludes this series opener. Potter keeps the third-person narrative tightly focused on Hugo’s perspective, and the details she uses to flesh out the Sasquatch world are delightfully playful. Sala’s drawings depict a homey Sasquatch cavern community, Boone as a freckled, white boy, and Hugo as a hairily benevolent behemoth.
A charming friendship story and great setup for future books. (final art unseen) (Fantasy. 5-9)Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4197-2859-4
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2018
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