Bang's trademark striking colors and bold outlines enhance this welcome new book that’s as much about the creative process...
From the author/illustrator of Caldecott Honor book When Sophie Gets Angry—Really, Really Angry (1999) comes another book about coping with emotional upheaval.
Sophie’s a little older and her emotions, a bit more complex in this second, longer story. Her teacher gives the class an assignment to choose a tree to paint the next day. Sophie chooses her favorite beech tree, where she still finds comfort when she’s angry or sad. Her tree’s bark is gray, but using gray paint to represent it feels wrong somehow. Grappling with the challenge of conveying the happiness the tree gives her, she boldly paints it turquoise and makes the sky orange for contrast. She loves the way it looks, but her classmates laugh at her efforts, telling her that her painting is all wrong. Sophie is crushed and mortified. Bang uses perspective to great effect in a double-page spread showing Sophie from above, hands inert by her sides, shrinking away from both readers and her painting as the tears flow. Happily, the teacher steps in with a warm embrace and calmly talks the class through the different ways that their paintings all express their individual feelings about their trees.
Bang's trademark striking colors and bold outlines enhance this welcome new book that’s as much about the creative process as it is about emotion. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-545-78831-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Blue Sky/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 5, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015
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Another quirky take on the series theme that it’s cool to be kind.
The cool beans again step up to do a timorous fellow legume a fava…this time at the pool.
Will a rash decision to tackle the multistory super-slide lead to another embarrassing watery fail for our shy protagonist? Nope, for up the stairs right behind comes a trio of cool beans, each a different type and color, all clad in nothing but dark shades. They make an offer: “It’s not as scary if you go with friends!” As the knobby nerd explains once the thrilling ride down is done, “They all realized that I just needed some encouragement and support.” Just to make sure that both cool and uncool readers get the message, the narrator lets us know that “there are plenty of kind folks who have my back. They’re always there when I need them.” The beany bonhomie doesn’t end at the bottom of the slide, with all gliding down to the shallow end of the pool (“3 INCHES. NO DIVING”) for a splashy finale. This latest early reader starring characters from John and Oswald’s immensely popular Food Group series will be a hit with fans. Fun accessories, such as a bean who rocks pink cat-eye frames, add some pizzazz to the chromatically and somatotypically varied cast.
Another quirky take on the series theme that it’s cool to be kind. (Easy reader. 5-7)Pub Date: March 26, 2024
ISBN: 9780063329560
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2024
Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back.
With such short arms, how can Tiny T. Rex give a sad friend a hug?
Fleck goes for cute in the simple, minimally detailed illustrations, drawing the diminutive theropod with a chubby turquoise body and little nubs for limbs under a massive, squared-off head. Impelled by the sight of stegosaurian buddy Pointy looking glum, little Tiny sets out to attempt the seemingly impossible, a comforting hug. Having made the rounds seeking advice—the dino’s pea-green dad recommends math; purple, New Age aunt offers cucumber juice (“That is disgusting”); red mom tells him that it’s OK not to be able to hug (“You are tiny, but your heart is big!”), and blue and yellow older sibs suggest practice—Tiny takes up the last as the most immediately useful notion. Unfortunately, the “tree” the little reptile tries to hug turns out to be a pterodactyl’s leg. “Now I am falling,” Tiny notes in the consistently self-referential narrative. “I should not have let go.” Fortunately, Tiny lands on Pointy’s head, and the proclamation that though Rexes’ hugs may be tiny, “I will do my very best because you are my very best friend” proves just the mood-lightening ticket. “Thank you, Tiny. That was the biggest hug ever.” Young audiences always find the “clueless grown-ups” trope a knee-slapper, the overall tone never turns preachy, and Tiny’s instinctive kindness definitely puts him at (gentle) odds with the dinky dino star of Bob Shea’s Dinosaur Vs. series.
Wins for compassion and for the refusal to let physical limitations hold one back. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: March 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4521-7033-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 11, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018
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