Technologically and artistically juvenile, but still a taste of good cheeky fun.
Two unfortunate children are treated to a day of “fun.”
This title offers ample opportunity to teach children the meaning of irony, or, as the author says, to appreciate “inappropriate humor.” The story begins with the female narrator (presumably their mother) asking brother and sister if they’re ready to have fun. She then proceeds to offer up potential activities. “Let’s go to Cousin Sally’s recital!” she says enthusiastically. Touch the twinkling starburst over Sally’s hands, and she begins to bang recklessly on the keyboard. Among other things, Mom suggests going to the doctor (“Maybe it'll be shot day!”) and using stinky portable toilets (complete with tinkling and tooting sounds). Each page offers an interactive element that’s signaled by a starburst; among the oddest are tiny octopi that shower a healthy lunch. There are a few activities that parents may not want to associate with the concept of “worst.” For example, the very nature of the book puts visiting great-grandma, brushing and flossing teeth, putting on sunscreen and doing household chores on the same plane as pulling splinters out of your foot, getting a shot, going bra shopping with Mommy and listening to a baby scream his head off.
Technologically and artistically juvenile, but still a taste of good cheeky fun. (iPad storybook app. 4-8)Pub Date: Dec. 13, 2011
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: TwizzleTales
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2012
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
As ephemeral as a valentine.
Daywalt and Jeffers’ wandering crayons explore love.
Each double-page spread offers readers a vision of one of the anthropomorphic crayons on the left along with the statement “Love is [color].” The word love is represented by a small heart in the appropriate color. Opposite, childlike crayon drawings explain how that color represents love. So, readers learn, “love is green. / Because love is helpful.” The accompanying crayon drawing depicts two alligators, one holding a recycling bin and the other tossing a plastic cup into it, offering readers two ways of understanding green. Some statements are thought-provoking: “Love is white. / Because sometimes love is hard to see,” reaches beyond the immediate image of a cat’s yellow eyes, pink nose, and black mouth and whiskers, its white face and body indistinguishable from the paper it’s drawn on, to prompt real questions. “Love is brown. / Because sometimes love stinks,” on the other hand, depicted by a brown bear standing next to a brown, squiggly turd, may provoke giggles but is fundamentally a cheap laugh. Some of the color assignments have a distinctly arbitrary feel: Why is purple associated with the imagination and pink with silliness? Fans of The Day the Crayons Quit (2013) hoping for more clever, metaliterary fun will be disappointed by this rather syrupy read.
As ephemeral as a valentine. (Picture book. 4-6)Pub Date: Dec. 24, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5247-9268-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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