A natural for fans of Jon Klassen’s terse creature capers.
A sparely told French knee-slapper features a chameleon, a rabbit and a pair of repurposed undies.
Twice repurposed, as it turns out. Having enjoyed his customary breakfast fly, green Leon “has to go poo”—and discovers too late that there’s no paper. Happily, he finds a pair of red patterned underwear “full of holes,” hanging from a twig. But hardly has he chucked the soiled briefs into a bush than an insistent little voice drives him to repent of the theft, scrub the rag clean and hang it up again. “Since when are we allowed to touch other people’s things? What do they teach you in school, anyway?” That voice of conscience, as it turns out, actually belongs to an annoyed rabbit in cape and costume. He emerges from hiding to reclaim the garment, tug it over his (wait for it) ears (the “holes” turn out to be eyeholes) and fly off. The text, printed in different colors and typefaces depending on the speaker, is placed over minimally detailed outdoor scenes created with splatters and thin layers of paint, featuring skinny-limbed figures with beady, expressive eyes.
A natural for fans of Jon Klassen’s terse creature capers. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 12, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-59270-131-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Enchanted Lion Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 5, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Perfect for those looking for a scary Halloween tale that won’t leave them with more fears than they started with. Pair with...
Reynolds and Brown have crafted a Halloween tale that balances a really spooky premise with the hilarity that accompanies any mention of underwear.
Jasper Rabbit needs new underwear. Plain White satisfies him until he spies them: “Creepy underwear! So creepy! So comfy! They were glorious.” The underwear of his dreams is a pair of radioactive-green briefs with a Frankenstein face on the front, the green color standing out all the more due to Brown’s choice to do the entire book in grayscale save for the underwear’s glowing green…and glow they do, as Jasper soon discovers. Despite his “I’m a big rabbit” assertion, that glow creeps him out, so he stuffs them in the hamper and dons Plain White. In the morning, though, he’s wearing green! He goes to increasing lengths to get rid of the glowing menace, but they don’t stay gone. It’s only when Jasper finally admits to himself that maybe he’s not such a big rabbit after all that he thinks of a clever solution to his fear of the dark. Brown’s illustrations keep the backgrounds and details simple so readers focus on Jasper’s every emotion, writ large on his expressive face. And careful observers will note that the underwear’s expression also changes, adding a bit more creep to the tale.
Perfect for those looking for a scary Halloween tale that won’t leave them with more fears than they started with. Pair with Dr. Seuss’ tale of animate, empty pants. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Aug. 22, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4424-0298-0
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
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