An engaging and approachable introduction to starting a kid-sized business.
A young girl starts her own business in this picture book about budding entrepreneurship.
When Amber overhears her parents talking about their budget being too tight to build her a treehouse, the girl is not sad—she wants to help. She asks them what her best skills are and calculates how to turn those strengths into a business. After she decides she’ll pot plants to sell, she asks her friend Jasmine to assist her. They produce potted plants for a local carnival, but the profits are not enough to make back Amber’s initial investment. They decide to expand to online sales and enlist their class to help. When Amber reaches her goal, it turns out her family’s money issues have been resolved, so she uses the profits to build a treehouse at her school for everyone to enjoy. Elzein breaks down the costs of starting a business as well as profits per unit in simple spreadsheets and equations throughout the appealing story, showing the math behind the project. But neither the author nor Amber accounts for the marketing costs or the value of labor. While Amber’s teacher praises her for having “a business mind and a kind heart,” the girl’s resolution to share the profits feels just rather than charitable, given all the labor her friends have contributed. Wang’s bright cartoon illustrations include a diverse group of kids with different skin tones and clothing styles (including a girl who wears a hijab).
An engaging and approachable introduction to starting a kid-sized business.Pub Date: June 11, 2023
ISBN: 9781954507098
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Nov. 28, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Embedded in this heartwarming story of doing the right thing is a deft examination of the pressures of income inequality on...
Continuing from their acclaimed Those Shoes (2007), Boelts and Jones entwine conversations on money, motives, and morality.
This second collaboration between author and illustrator is set within an urban multicultural streetscape, where brown-skinned protagonist Ruben wishes for a bike like his friend Sergio’s. He wishes, but Ruben knows too well the pressure his family feels to prioritize the essentials. While Sergio buys a pack of football cards from Sonny’s Grocery, Ruben must buy the bread his mom wants. A familiar lady drops what Ruben believes to be a $1 bill, but picking it up, to his shock, he discovers $100! Is this Ruben’s chance to get himself the bike of his dreams? In a fateful twist, Ruben loses track of the C-note and is sent into a panic. After finally finding it nestled deep in a backpack pocket, he comes to a sense of moral clarity: “I remember how it was for me when that money that was hers—then mine—was gone.” When he returns the bill to her, the lady offers Ruben her blessing, leaving him with double-dipped emotions, “happy and mixed up, full and empty.” Readers will be pleased that there’s no reward for Ruben’s choice of integrity beyond the priceless love and warmth of a family’s care and pride.
Embedded in this heartwarming story of doing the right thing is a deft examination of the pressures of income inequality on children. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-7636-6649-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2016
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