Sublime.
Seasons come and go, and two unlikely friends help the garden prosper.
In a quiet corner, a shy spider listens, tucked in a comfy leaf. Leaves rustle in the wind, the garden tap drip, drip, drips, and high in a tree the owl family hoots (“Twit-twoo”). This is Little Spider’s life day after day. One morning, she hears “Hurry, scurry, worry-worry,” and the sound keeps her from falling asleep. It’s Anxious Ant, rushing around to finish preparations for winter. Tolland gives readers a glimpse underground, where Ant is collecting piles of seeds. “Hurry, scurry, worry-worry,” is its refrain. Little Spider worries that there won’t be any seeds aboveground in the spring, but Anxious Ant says he’s too busy to think about that. Winter is coming! Little Spider offers a trade; she will spin a warm, silky scarf for Anxious Ant in exchange for five seeds. Their friendship is forged. In the spring, with help from sunshine and rain, the seeds sprout into delicate seedlings that, in time, grow into juicy fruit. In the autumn, the unpicked fruit falls to the ground and bursts open, revealing more seeds! Anxious Ant is amazed. He learns not to hoard the seeds but save only a few. That’s all he needs. McKinnon’s ecologically minded tale unfolds with a gentleness that’s in perfect harmony with her lesson. Tolland’s beautiful illustrations do not anthropomorphize her characters but invest them with personality nonetheless; Little Spider’s garden is indeed a lovely one.
Sublime. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-76036-031-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Starfish Bay
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
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
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts.
Can knightly deeds bring together a feathered odd couple who are on opposite daily schedules?
Having won over a dragon (and millions of fans) in the Caldecott Honor–winning Knight Owl (2022), the fierce yet impossibly cute nocturnal, armor-clad owlet faces a new challenge—sleep deprivation—in the wake of taking on Early Bird, a trainee who rises with the sun and chatters interminably: “I made pancakes! Do you like pancakes? I love pancakes! Where’s the syrup?” It’s enough to test the patience of even the knightliest of owls, and eventually Knight Owl explodes in anger. But although Early Bird is even smaller than her mentor, she turns out to be just as determined to achieve knighthood. After he tells her to leave, she acquits herself so nobly in a climactic encounter with a pack of wolves that she earns a place at the castle. Denise proves a dab hand at depicting genuinely slinky, scary wolves as well as slipping cheerfully anachronistic newspapers and other sight gags into his realistically wrought medieval settings to underscore the tale’s tongue-in-cheek tone. Better yet, a final view of the doughty duo sitting down together to a lavish pancake breakfast/dinner at dusk ends the episode in a sweet rush of syrup and bonhomie.
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9780316564526
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
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