A short, sweet cautionary tale, brimming with character.
In Usman’s picture book debut, a boy trades the sanctity of the local lake for a chance to own the clouds.
Jalal, who has black hair and light brown skin, lives in a village beside Lake Lanao in the Philippines. The lake provides fish for the village, and its waters are essential for drinking, bathing and irrigation. Every week, all the villagers but one celebrate the lake; the exception is Jalal, the only son of community leader Sulutan Abdul, who dreams of owning the clouds. When dark-suited men offer to grant his wish, asking to dump rubbish in the lake in exchange, Jalal begs his father to agree. The Sulutan does, with disastrous results (“Children are getting sick. We wish our lake was clean again”) that Jalal then has to set right. Because the story is presented bilingually—first in English then in the Austronesian language Meranaw—the pages appear text-heavy. The layout, however, makes astute use of blank spaces, and the two-page spreads offer ample visual input to balance the verbiage. Palita’s vibrant art brings the story to life, combining manga-style figures with digital watercolor backgrounds to capture the tranquil beauty of the landscape and the purple- and yellow-hued splendor of the Muslim festivities. The prominent use of curls as graphic elements adds a dreamlike quality that is suitable for fable—young children will find themselves immersed in Jalal’s world.
A short, sweet cautionary tale, brimming with character.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 9781733533522
Page Count: 28
Publisher: Sari-Sari Storybooks
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A brisk if bland offering for series fans, but cleverer metafictive romps abound.
The titular cookie runs off the page at a bookstore storytime, pursued by young listeners and literary characters.
Following on 13 previous How To Catch… escapades, Wallace supplies sometimes-tortured doggerel and Elkerton, a set of helter-skelter cartoon scenes. Here the insouciant narrator scampers through aisles, avoiding a series of elaborate snares set by the racially diverse young storytime audience with help from some classic figures: “Alice and her mad-hat friends, / as a gift for my unbirthday, / helped guide me through the walls of shelves— / now I’m bound to find my way.” The literary helpers don’t look like their conventional or Disney counterparts in the illustrations, but all are clearly identified by at least a broad hint or visual cue, like the unnamed “wizard” who swoops in on a broom to knock over a tower labeled “Frogwarts.” Along with playing a bit fast and loose with details (“Perhaps the boy with the magic beans / saved me with his cow…”) the author discards his original’s lip-smacking climax to have the errant snack circling back at last to his book for a comfier sort of happily-ever-after.
A brisk if bland offering for series fans, but cleverer metafictive romps abound. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7282-0935-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
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
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BOOK REVIEW
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