When Jamaica’s friend Kristin comes over, she’s got a kitten in a shoebox with her. She can’t keep the kitten, she explains, because her older cat doesn’t get along with it. Would Jamaica like to have Puffy? Jamaica’s doubtful, because her brother, Ossie, is allergic to cats, but Puffy’s only a kitten, and he’s sooo cute. It doesn’t take long before Ossie starts sneezing (Jamaica had made a bed for Puffy out of his spare football jersey), and Jamaica reluctantly decides that Puffy will have to go to Kristin’s aunt after all. Like its predecessors in the series, this has a winning simplicity. There are no hijinks, no tantrums—just Jamaica’s hope and her subsequent acceptance of reality. Kristin should be thankful she can have a cat at all, says Jamaica, but she should be thankful, too, that she has a brother. O’Brien’s warm pastel-and-watercolor illustrations depict Jamaica and her family with a soft-edged affection. It’s not all bad to be reminded to be thankful. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-618-98231-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2009
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
Turkey’s in the “kind of trouble where it’s almost Thanksgiving...and you’re the main course.” Accordingly, Turkey tries on disguise after disguise, from horse to cow to pig to sheep, at each iteration being told that he looks nothing like the animal he’s trying to mimic (which is quite true, as Harper’s quirky watercolors make crystal clear). He desperately squeezes a red rubber glove onto his head to pass as a rooster, only to overhear the farmer suggest a poultry plan B when he’s unable to turn up the turkey. Turkey’s horrified expression as he stands among the peppers and tomatoes—in November? Chalk it up to artistic license—is priceless, but his surroundings give him an idea. Good fun, but it may lead to a vegetarian table or two. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-7614-5529-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Marshall Cavendish
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2009
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