It’s a pleasant-enough story, but it’s not quite effective as a way to draw young readers into a museum experience
Two animal friends explore the recently renovated grand Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.
Digging a tunnel, Mole accidentally discovers a beautiful building and brings his friend Monkey to explore the treasures inside. A chase ensues when a guard spots them and angrily shouts, “The museum is closed. And animals aren’t allowed in here!” As the two friends flee, they bump into an ornate 17th-century Delft vase, are helped by the little angel statue called Amor and otherwise encounter more precious works of art. Options include audio narration in English, Dutch, French and German, a choice of visible or invisible text, and automatic or manual page turns. Interactive features are minimal but suitable for young children. This storybook app works better as a charming story than an introduction to the recently renovated Rijksmuseum, though. While the colophon at the end provides young readers with information about each of the famous works of art, the emphasis is on the animal friends’ adventure. Spee’s illustrations capture the essence of the artwork but are impressions rather than realistic renditions, unlike Clara Button and the Magical Hat Day, by Amy de la Haye, illustrated by Emily Sutton and developed by MAPP Editions (2012), which captures readers’ interest with striking photographs of the artwork in the backmatter.
It’s a pleasant-enough story, but it’s not quite effective as a way to draw young readers into a museum experience . (iPad storybook app. 4-8)Pub Date: April 12, 2013
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: The House of Books
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2013
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
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
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