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SO MANY BABIES

Name: SO MANY BABIES
Author: Lorna Crozier
ISBN: 978-1-4598-0831-7

by Lorna Crozier ; illustrated by Laura Watson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 25, 2015

So Many Babies are a few too many.

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A board-book introduction to animal babies, at least pictorially.

Each page introduces a new animal and its habitat, sometimes giving hints to animal behavior, but it introduces more questions than it answers. The animals look more like cartoons that the real thing, a potential point of confusion. For instance, the elephant that accompanies the text “Babies in jungles” is pale green. Sometimes it is unclear which animal is featured—does “Babies in rivers” refer to the big-eyed beavers clinging to logs or to the school of fish they are eyeing? Worse, “babies in bogs” presents three smiling frogs and a few tadpoles, with no indication that the tadpoles are the babies. The species are not named, so adult readers are left guessing—is that a pile of bears in a cave or some more exotic creature? Readers may not be able to name the ring-tailed lemur or know that sea otters float on their backs, particularly when the drawing of the sea otter gives so few accurate clues. Rhyming text is choppy and forced. After all the cutesy animals, the final page changes the subject from animal babies to a saccharine assurance that “baby, my baby, there's no one like you!”

So Many Babies are a few too many. (Board book. 6 mos.-2)

Pub Date: Aug. 25, 2015

ISBN: 978-1-4598-0831-7

Page Count: 24

Publisher: Orca

Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

- BOOK REVIEW
MORE THAN BALLOONS
by Lorna Crozier ; illustrated by Rachelle Anne Miller

- BOOK REVIEW
LOTS OF KISSES
by Lorna Crozier

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CARPENTER'S HELPER

by Sybil Rosen ; illustrated by Camille Garoche ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 16, 2021

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.

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A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.

Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)

Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)

Pub Date: March 16, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random

Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

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LITTLE BLUE TRUCK'S SPRINGTIME

From the Little Blue Truck series

by Alice Schertle ; illustrated by Jill McElmurry ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 2, 2018

Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come.

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Little Blue Truck and his pal Toad meet friends old and new on a springtime drive through the country.

This lift-the-flap, interactive entry in the popular Little Blue Truck series lacks the narrative strength and valuable life lessons of the original Little Blue Truck (2008) and its sequel, Little Blue Truck Leads the Way (2009). Both of those books, published for preschoolers rather than toddlers, featured rich storylines, dramatic, kinetic illustrations, and simple but valuable life lessons—the folly of taking oneself too seriously, the importance of friends, and the virtue of taking turns, for example. At about half the length and with half as much text as the aforementioned titles, this volume is a much quicker read. Less a story than a vernal celebration, the book depicts a bucolic drive through farmland and encounters with various animals and their young along the way. Beautifully rendered two-page tableaux teem with butterflies, blossoms, and vibrant pastel, springtime colors. Little Blue greets a sheep standing in the door of a barn: “Yoo-hoo, Sheep! / Beep-beep! / What’s new?” Folding back the durable, card-stock flap reveals the barn’s interior and an adorable set of twin lambs. Encounters with a duck and nine ducklings, a cow with a calf, a pig with 10 (!) piglets, a family of bunnies, and a chicken with a freshly hatched chick provide ample opportunity for counting and vocabulary work.

Uncomplicated fun that sets readers up for the earlier, more-complicated books to come. (Board book. 1-4)