A delightful animal tale of friendship, adaptability, and resilience.
A reluctant crocodile finds a surprising new home in this picture book.
After Fred discovers the riverbed where he lives has dried up, he leaves in search of a more hospitable place. But after passing “grasslands…mountains, and forests and deserts of sand,” the crocodile loses hope. Fred begins to “weep…blubber and cry” for five days. On the sixth day, Fred—who still feels “blubbery and blue”—is approached by a frog who asks if he’s all right. Fred answers: “I’m as sad as can be. I’ve lost my home” and am “stuck in this desert that’s drier than bone.” After the frog tells the crocodile to open his eyes, Fred sees “the grandest river he ever saw.” The frog, who understands the importance of embracing change, says: “This river you’ve cried should be called ‘Crocodile Tears.’ ” Fred grows to love his new environs, particularly the animals. He realizes that “home…is not just a place,” but “a feeling of warmth deep inside, of happiness and joy and friends by your side.” This sweet story emphasizes essential lessons about change and personal development. While Kaushik’s tale shows that moving and getting used to new things can be challenging, Fred’s experience highlights ways to make the adjustments brighter and more comfortable, particularly through cultivating new friendships. The author’s adorable, full-color illustrations offer fun outdoor habitats featuring greenery and mountain backdrops. The cute critters have appealing features like vibrant smiles and big eyes.
A delightful animal tale of friendship, adaptability, and resilience.Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2021
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Meg & Company
Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.
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
Safe to creep on by.
Carle’s famous caterpillar expresses its love.
In three sentences that stretch out over most of the book’s 32 pages, the (here, at least) not-so-ravenous larva first describes the object of its love, then describes how that loved one makes it feel before concluding, “That’s why… / I[heart]U.” There is little original in either visual or textual content, much of it mined from The Very Hungry Caterpillar. “You are… / …so sweet,” proclaims the caterpillar as it crawls through the hole it’s munched in a strawberry; “…the cherry on my cake,” it says as it perches on the familiar square of chocolate cake; “…the apple of my eye,” it announces as it emerges from an apple. Images familiar from other works join the smiling sun that shone down on the caterpillar as it delivers assurances that “you make… / …the sun shine brighter / …the stars sparkle,” and so on. The book is small, only 7 inches high and 5 ¾ inches across when closed—probably not coincidentally about the size of a greeting card. While generations of children have grown up with the ravenous caterpillar, this collection of Carle imagery and platitudinous sentiment has little of his classic’s charm. The melding of Carle’s caterpillar with Robert Indiana’s iconic LOVE on the book’s cover, alas, draws further attention to its derivative nature.
Safe to creep on by. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Dec. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-448-48932-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2021
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