An enchanting tale of hope and wonder in the aftermath of disaster.
Roettiger’s illustrated children’s book celebrates a wombat who helps animals displaced by wildfires in Australia.
The story starts as a news report in a television studio featuring a backdrop of Sydney’s cityscape and famous Harbour Bridge, doused in yellow smoke. At the news desk, anchors Koala and Emu comment on the wildfires and how they started: “It’s the driest year on record and left us in a drought. We’ve got temperatures hot enough to melt cars from here to Wagga Wagga.” Kangaroo is at the scene for a special report on Wombat, who, after other animals’ homes were destroyed, offered her home underground as a sanctuary for families of echidnas, rabbits, skinks, and wallabies. Palen’s full-page, muted color illustrations feature whimsical watercolor skies and three-dimensional cartoon-style creatures with detailed pencil-stroke fur and expressive faces. As Wombat tells her story, flashback vignettes depict red, raging flames before transitioning to the safety of the protagonist’s burrow and her many animal guests. The book features an educational section on Australian animals, and an author’s note reveals that rescuers really did discover animals sheltering with wombats during the 2019-20 New South Wales bushfires. Roettiger’s prose is animated and lively, with clear, crisp sentences and a quick, even pace that faithfully mimics traditional TV news. As the book goes on, it skillfully achieves a balance of entertainment and education. Readers will enjoy noticing tiny bilbies donning headsets in the TV studio and Kangaroo’s use of an oven mitt to hold the mic on location; such details are sweetly diverting additions to an already engaging story. There’s also something charming about a story such as this being told by the animals themselves.
An enchanting tale of hope and wonder in the aftermath of disaster.Pub Date: Feb. 12, 2024
ISBN: 9781632333759
Page Count: 34
Publisher: Eifrig Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A hilarious autumnal comedy of errors.
A confused squirrel overreacts to the falling autumn leaves.
Relaxing on a tree branch, Squirrel admires the red, gold, and orange leaves. Suddenly Squirrel screams, “One of my leaves is…MISSING!” Searching for the leaf, Squirrel tells Bird, “Someone stole my leaf!” Spying Mouse sailing in a leaf boat, Squirrel asks if Mouse stole the leaf. Mouse calmly replies in the negative. Bird reminds Squirrel it’s “perfectly normal to lose a leaf or two at this time of year.” Next morning Squirrel panics again, shrieking, “MORE LEAVES HAVE BEEN STOLEN!” Noticing Woodpecker arranging colorful leaves, Squirrel queries, “Are those my leaves?” Woodpecker tells Squirrel, “No.” Again, Bird assures Squirrel that no one’s taking the leaves and that the same thing happened last year, then encourages Squirrel to relax. Too wired to relax despite some yoga and a bath, the next day Squirrel cries “DISASTER” at the sight of bare branches. Frantic now, Squirrel becomes suspicious upon discovering Bird decorating with multicolored leaves. Is Bird the culprit? In response, Bird shows Squirrel the real Leaf Thief: the wind. Squirrel’s wildly dramatic, misguided, and hyperpossessive reaction to a routine seasonal event becomes a rib-tickling farce through clever use of varying type sizes and weights emphasizing his absurd verbal pronouncements as well as exaggerated, comic facial expressions and body language. Bold colors, arresting perspectives, and intense close-ups enhance Squirrel’s histrionics. Endnotes explain the science behind the phenomenon.
A hilarious autumnal comedy of errors. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7282-3520-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: June 1, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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