The 230 photos—often-breathtaking, in-the-moment portraits—are accessed via pins on a world map, as a slide show or as a...
A photo gallery–as-app is light on features yet becomes a moving visual statement communicated through the faces of hundreds of kids from around the world.
The 230 photos—often-breathtaking, in-the-moment portraits—are accessed via pins on a world map, as a slide show or as a gallery with a simple horizontal bar as navigation. Each photo has a caption that can be accessed by tapping a word-balloon button. The one-line descriptions are light on detail, yet evocative. "Wearing his last meal as lipstick, a full child takes a break from dining and greets a visitor to his simple home in a riverside African village," reads a caption for a photo taken in Juffure, The Gambia. But it's the faces of the children themselves that are most compelling. Whether they appear to be bored or giddy, engaged in activity or posing for a foreigner's camera, their emotions are sometimes as clear as what the backdrops tell us about their living conditions. The cumulative effect gives readers (especially young ones) a small sense of the scale of the Earth and its many inhabitants. If there's anything missing, it's a cleverer way to browse the images than flipping through them one by one, pointing on a clunky map or rolling a too-tiny thumbnail bar. And, though the app is visually overstuffed, there's no sound at all. It's as if the kids all went eerily silent when even a few sound clips would have enhanced the app greatly.Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2012
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Banzai Labs
Review Posted Online: Feb. 14, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2012
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs.
The Heffley family’s house undergoes a disastrous attempt at home improvement.
When Great Aunt Reba dies, she leaves some money to the family. Greg’s mom calls a family meeting to determine what to do with their share, proposing home improvements and then overruling the family’s cartoonish wish lists and instead pushing for an addition to the kitchen. Before bringing in the construction crew, the Heffleys attempt to do minor maintenance and repairs themselves—during which Greg fails at the work in various slapstick scenes. Once the professionals are brought in, the problems keep getting worse: angry neighbors, terrifying problems in walls, and—most serious—civil permitting issues that put the kibosh on what work’s been done. Left with only enough inheritance to patch and repair the exterior of the house—and with the school’s dismal standardized test scores as a final straw—Greg’s mom steers the family toward moving, opening up house-hunting and house-selling storylines (and devastating loyal Rowley, who doesn’t want to lose his best friend). While Greg’s positive about the move, he’s not completely uncaring about Rowley’s action. (And of course, Greg himself is not as unaffected as he wishes.) The gags include effectively placed callbacks to seemingly incidental events (the “stress lizard” brought in on testing day is particularly funny) and a lampoon of after-school-special–style problem books. Just when it seems that the Heffleys really will move, a new sequence of chaotic trouble and property destruction heralds a return to the status quo. Whew.
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs. (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-12)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3903-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
A friendship tale with solid messaging and plenty of fun sounds to share.
In this latest in the series, Little Blue Truck, driven by pal Toad, is challenged to a countryside race by Racer Red, a sleek, low-slung vehicle.
Blue agrees, and the race is on. Although the two start off “hood to hood / and wheel to wheel,” they switch positions often as they speed their way over dusty country roads. Blue’s farm friends follow along to share in the excitement and shout out encouragement; adult readers will have fun voicing the various animal sounds. Short rhyming verses on each page and several strategic page turns add drama to the narrative, but soft, mottled effects in the otherwise colorful illustrations keep the competition from becoming too intense. Racer Red crosses the finish line first, but Blue is a gracious loser, happy to have worked hard. That’s a new concept for Racer Red, who’s laser-focused on victory but takes Blue’s words (“win or lose, it’s fun to try!”) to heart—a revelation that may lead to worthwhile storytime discussions. When Blue’s farm animal friends hop into the truck for the ride home, Racer Red tags along and learns a second lesson, one about speed. “Fast is fun, / and slow is too, / as long as you’re / with friends.”
A friendship tale with solid messaging and plenty of fun sounds to share. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: March 25, 2025
ISBN: 9780063387843
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Jan. 18, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2025
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