This well-crafted horse story explores the themes of friendship and facing fears for those getting ready to move on from...
Transitioning readers enamored with horses will be happy to immerse themselves in the third title of the Bramble and Maggie series, in which Maggie and her horse learn to cope with real and imagined fears.
In each of the three chapters, Bramble spooks at the various sights and particular sounds of autumn. First Bramble is made uneasy by the new scarecrow in a neighbor’s yard. But Maggie coaxes her equine friend to take a closer look. Who knew something a bit scary could be so tasty! The next chapter finds Bramble reacting to falling acorns. As she goes one way, Maggie goes the other way…and falls. Maggie wants to call it a day, but Bramble knows that “riders always got back on. That made them feel much better. Bramble stood very still….She waited.” Finally it is Halloween, and the two friends need to decide how to dress up. But now the lanes are full of scary-looking creatures. Each of the pair must find her courage so that the other will not be afraid. Haas keeps descriptive language succinct while integrating entertaining dialogue. Friend’s gouache illustrations ably depict Bramble’s expressions of alarm and stubborn persistence, humorously extending the text.
This well-crafted horse story explores the themes of friendship and facing fears for those getting ready to move on from early readers. (Early reader. 5-8)Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-7636-6450-3
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2014
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
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts.
Can knightly deeds bring together a feathered odd couple who are on opposite daily schedules?
Having won over a dragon (and millions of fans) in the Caldecott Honor–winning Knight Owl (2022), the fierce yet impossibly cute nocturnal, armor-clad owlet faces a new challenge—sleep deprivation—in the wake of taking on Early Bird, a trainee who rises with the sun and chatters interminably: “I made pancakes! Do you like pancakes? I love pancakes! Where’s the syrup?” It’s enough to test the patience of even the knightliest of owls, and eventually Knight Owl explodes in anger. But although Early Bird is even smaller than her mentor, she turns out to be just as determined to achieve knighthood. After he tells her to leave, she acquits herself so nobly in a climactic encounter with a pack of wolves that she earns a place at the castle. Denise proves a dab hand at depicting genuinely slinky, scary wolves as well as slipping cheerfully anachronistic newspapers and other sight gags into his realistically wrought medieval settings to underscore the tale’s tongue-in-cheek tone. Better yet, a final view of the doughty duo sitting down together to a lavish pancake breakfast/dinner at dusk ends the episode in a sweet rush of syrup and bonhomie.
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9780316564526
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
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