This girl’s road to self-acceptance is playful, easy, and filled with love.
Jamilla’s mom has many reasons why Jamilla should not hate her hair in this lively Canadian import.
It’s time to do her hair before school, and Jamilla hides the comb inside her puffy hair. She hates her hair; “It hurts. It’s a pain.” She wants to know why she has “bad” hair instead of “good hair” that’s “long and soft and pretty” like her classmates’. Her mother tells her it’s silly to want their hair when “the most fantabulous, splendiferous, boonoonoonous hair in the world is right here.” They agree that if she doesn’t cry or hide the comb anymore, Jamilla can wear her hair in a different style every day of the year. A week’s worth of hairstyles is pictured—including puffs, braids, cornrows, twists, a “wild” Afro, and, for Sunday, in ribbons as “Grandmother’s child.” James’ illustrations use strong lines, stylized facial features, and bold colors, with backgrounds of turquoise and yellow. They show the young black girl in various settings—a park, an art museum, a playground. The titular adjective will require translation for those unfamiliar with Jamaican patois, and the idea of changing hairstyles daily overlooks the effort that goes into each. Still, the energy between mother and child is infectious, and the rhythmic text is great fun to read.
This girl’s road to self-acceptance is playful, easy, and filled with love. (Picture book. 5-9)Pub Date: July 15, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-926890-07-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tradewind Books
Review Posted Online: May 11, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This story covers the few days preceding the much-anticipated Midnight Zombie Walk, when Stink and company will take to the...
An all-zombie-all-the-time zombiefest, featuring a bunch of grade-school kids, including protagonist Stink and his happy comrades.
This story covers the few days preceding the much-anticipated Midnight Zombie Walk, when Stink and company will take to the streets in the time-honored stiff-armed, stiff-legged fashion. McDonald signals her intent on page one: “Stink and Webster were playing Attack of the Knitting Needle Zombies when Fred Zombie’s eye fell off and rolled across the floor.” The farce is as broad as the Atlantic, with enough spookiness just below the surface to provide the all-important shivers. Accompanied by Reynolds’ drawings—dozens of scene-setting gems with good, creepy living dead—McDonald shapes chapters around zombie motifs: making zombie costumes, eating zombie fare at school, reading zombie books each other to reach the one-million-minutes-of-reading challenge. When the zombie walk happens, it delivers solid zombie awfulness. McDonald’s feel-good tone is deeply encouraging for readers to get up and do this for themselves because it looks like so much darned fun, while the sub-message—that reading grows “strong hearts and minds,” as well as teeth and bones—is enough of a vital interest to the story line to be taken at face value.Pub Date: March 13, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-7636-5692-8
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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