A silly but thoughtful and enjoyable tale that features quirky characters.
Two plucky lobster-shaped socks get separated in this picture book.
Emily, a light-skinned young woman, receives a pair of hand-knitted, lobster-shaped socks from her grandmother and is shocked to discover they can talk. Additionally, the anthropomorphic socks have distinct personalities. Sebastian, the left sock, is cranky while the right one, Lola, is warmhearted. Still, the two are “best friends.” Emily takes the lobsters to the laundromat, where they get washed and dried and meet a cat named Bubbles. On the way home, Lola falls out of the laundry basket. When Sebastian realizes his pal is missing, he experiences emotions like depression and anger. Finally, he feels acceptance. But then “Sebastian started thinking, ‘What would Lola do?’ Actions speak louder than words! He decided to look for her.” Lola, stranded in the street, feels scared and alone but calms herself by taking deep breaths. When Bubbles hears her cries, the feline retrieves the sock and takes her home, carrying Lola in her mouth. Lola is thrilled when she spots Emily and Sebastian hanging up “Missing” posters, indicating that they’re worried about her. The socks are relieved to be reunited. Although the concept in this engaging story is humorous, Bulriss deftly emphasizes essentials ideas for youngsters, such as effectively handling emotions and building resilience. The author’s illustrations offer colorful, graphic, and cartoonlike portrayals. Most show up-close depictions of the socks’ expressive faces.
A silly but thoughtful and enjoyable tale that features quirky characters.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 33
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Dec. 8, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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
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