The clumsy duckling overcomes his growing pains and gets the girl in this wonderfully silly story. Mother mallard gives flying and swimming lessons to her seven young drakes, but Otis always gets distracted by other things. Tadpoles and hummingbirds are fascinating to him—so interesting, in fact, that although he learns to fly he somehow misses the landing lessons. All seven brothers are smitten by Violet, who lives on the same lake. Each shows off his own talents trying to win her favor, but she dreams of a daring duck and a life of adventure. All but Otis give up. Instead, he picks her a bouquet and then crash-lands in the mud during delivery. When she laughs at him, he wanders into the forest and spends a lonely winter. Upon his return, he’s a changed duck—“Jack Quack, Renegade Drake. Prince of the Forest, King of the Lake.” Otis still has mishaps, but now they are seen as daring rescues. Will Violet see through his disguise to the duck she has always dreamed of? Nolan has a masterful pace, mixing the humorous with the adventurous, and making Otis the hero of it all. The marvelously funny illustrations show all of Otis’s clumsy mistakes and rescues. Newcomer Wesson’s watercolors are especially vibrant and detailed, especially in the ducks’ facial expressions. Jack Quack is sure to take off. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-7614-5091-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Marshall Cavendish
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2001
The wriggly narrator of Diary of a Worm (2003) puts in occasional appearances, but it’s his arachnid buddy who takes center stage here, with terse, tongue-in-cheek comments on his likes (his close friend Fly, Charlotte’s Web), his dislikes (vacuums, people with big feet), nervous encounters with a huge Daddy Longlegs, his extended family—which includes a Grandpa more than willing to share hard-won wisdom (The secret to a long, happy life: “Never fall asleep in a shoe.”)—and mishaps both at spider school and on the human playground. Bliss endows his garden-dwellers with faces and the odd hat or other accessory, and creates cozy webs or burrows colorfully decorated with corks, scraps, plastic toys and other human detritus. Spider closes with the notion that we could all get along, “just like me and Fly,” if we but got to know one another. Once again, brilliantly hilarious. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-06-000153-4
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Joanna Cotler/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2005
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
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