Lively and engaging acrylic-and-pastel illustrations that include bits of lace, fabric and other found items accompany 29 poems describing the school experiences, from first day to last, of a middle-grade class. A variety of styles are included: haiku, quatrain, acrostic, free verse and others. Most of the poems are no more than ten to 12 lines and are written in the students’ voices, with child-appealing topics like “Tag” and “The Class I Hate.” The title poem may make school administrators cringe, as food flies across the double-page spread: “A cafeteria ballad— / it started with tossed salad… / (That lettuce really flew! / We’re glad it wasn’t stew!)” Happily, the following poem, “Indoor Storm,” finds everyone pitching in to clean up the disaster. The interesting combination of identifiable poetic forms and Yoshikawa’s amusing illustrations should make this a popular choice for classroom reading, as students recognize at least some of their own school experiences (though, one hopes, not food fights) in the poetry. (Picture book/poetry. 5-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-4027-4145-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sterling
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2008
This heavily earnest celebration of multi-ethnicity combines full-bleed paintings of smiling children, viewed through a golden haze dancing, playing, planting seedlings, and the like, with a hyperbolic, disconnected text—``Dark as leopard spots, light as sand,/Children buzz with laughter that kisses our land...''— printed in wavy lines. Literal-minded readers may have trouble with the author's premise, that ``Children come in all the colors of the earth and sky and sea'' (green? blue?), and most of the children here, though of diverse and mixed racial ancestry, wear shorts and T-shirts and seem to be about the same age. Hamanaka has chosen a worthy theme, but she develops it without the humor or imagination that animates her Screen of Frogs (1993). (Picture book. 5-7)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1994
ISBN: 0-688-11131-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1994
A little girl is going with her daddy to visit the home of Langston Hughes. She too is a poet who writes about the loves of her life—her mommy and daddy, hip-hop, hopscotch, and double-dutch, but decidedly not kissing games. Langston is her inspiration because his poems make her “dreams run wild.” In simple, joyful verse Perdomo tells of this “Harlem girl” from “Harlem world” whose loving, supportive father tells her she is “Langston’s genius child.” The author’s own admiration for Hughes’s artistry and accomplishments is clearly felt in the voice of this glorious child. Langston’s spirit is a gentle presence throughout the description of his East 127th Street home and his method of composing his poetry sitting by the window. The presentation is stunning. Each section of the poem is part of a two-page spread. Text, in yellow, white, or black, is placed either within the illustrations or in large blocks of color along side them. The last page of text is a compilation of titles of Hughes’s poems printed in shades of gray in a myriad of fonts. Collier’s (Martin’s Big Words, 2001, etc.) brilliantly complex watercolor-and-collage illustrations provide the perfect visual complement to the work. From the glowing vitality of the little girl, to the vivid scenes of jazz-age Harlem, to the compelling portrait of Langston at work, to the reverential peak into Langston’s home, the viewer’s eye is constantly drawn to intriguing bits and pieces while never losing the sense of the whole. In this year of Langston Hughes’s centennial, this work does him great honor. (Poetry. 6-10)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-8050-6744-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2002
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