While many would welcome a pirate-themed Halloween tale, this one isn’t quite shipshape.
When a pack of kids decides to all dress up as pirates for Halloween, their imaginations almost get the best of them.
Kimmelman uses rhyming text in her latest offering with mixed results. Yes, pirate fans will hear plenty of pirate lingo, but too often the rhythm feels forced. The story is, however, full of action as a diverse group of boys and girls eagerly sets off to get as much sweet loot as they can. Notably, the pirate chief is an African-American girl. As the gang makes its way through the neighborhood, a black creature in the shadows comes on the scene. Charlotte Blue-Tongue, Rude Ranjeet, and Glass-Eyed Gabby board their ship, but the shadowy figure gets closer. Is it a monster or a sea serpent? Here, Monlongo shifts from a deep-hued spread of reds, black, and purples with a menacing, sharp-toothed monster ready to swallow the boat whole to the next full-bleed spread, which reveals a shaggy, friendly big dog with its pink tongue hanging out expectantly. It’s a cute reveal, but the payoff doesn’t seem commensurate with the buildup. The illustrations have a textured look but ultimately do little to add subtlety to the overwrought wording.
While many would welcome a pirate-themed Halloween tale, this one isn’t quite shipshape. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-8075-8061-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Whitman
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A stocking stuffer par excellence, just right for dishing up with milk and cookies.
Pigeon finds something better to drive than some old bus.
This time it’s Santa delivering the fateful titular words, and with a “Ho. Ho. Whoa!” the badgering begins: “C’mon! Where’s your holiday spirit? It would be a Christmas MIRACLE! Don’t you want to be part of a Christmas miracle…?” Pigeon is determined: “I can do Santa stuff!” Like wrapping gifts (though the accompanying illustration shows a rather untidy present), delivering them (the image of Pigeon attempting to get an oversize sack down a chimney will have little ones giggling), and eating plenty of cookies. Alas, as Willems’ legion of young fans will gleefully predict, not even Pigeon’s by-now well-honed persuasive powers (“I CAN BE JOLLY!”) will budge the sleigh’s large and stinky reindeer guardian. “BAH. Also humbug.” In the typically minimalist art, the frustrated feathered one sports a floppily expressive green and red elf hat for this seasonal addition to the series—but then discards it at the end for, uh oh, a pair of bunny ears. What could Pigeon have in mind now? “Egg delivery, anyone?”
A stocking stuffer par excellence, just right for dishing up with milk and cookies. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Sept. 5, 2023
ISBN: 9781454952770
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Union Square Kids
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2023
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
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