When T’s friend Walter comes over to play, things go badly. Their expectations are great, so when they hit T’s room they are running at full throttle. T is a little taken aback by Walter’s fury—he smashes T’s bed-fort, he demolishes a truck they are building out of Legos—but T is game enough to join in the ruckus. Walter wants all the best stuff—the yellow marbles at Chinese checkers, for instance: “T didn’t want to be red”—but T appreciates that Walter is his guest, so he consents. Only when Walter grabs the better of the art materials, especially the only googly eyeball, does T snap, chucking his crumpled, crummy beige paper, which hits Walter on the ear. They both run wailing to T’s mother. She suggests a remedy: “It may be difficult to find,” she says. “The cure for the Horrible Play Date, . . . It’s in here,” she tells the boys, looking around T’s room. So the boys start searching and what they find, unbeknownst to them, is a shared quest—in a word, cooperation. Vail’s (Sometimes I’m Bombaloo, p. 53, etc.) story will strike resonant chords among its readers, no doubt, and Björkman’s (Safari Park, 2002, etc.) illustrations, with their sprays of color and hectic lines, practically define the book’s big word: rambunctious. But cooperation is an even bigger idea; the chemistry needed for its flowering, once the external stimulus has been applied—from T’s mother in this case—is more formulaic than earned in these pages. (Easy reader. 5-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-439-40627-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Orchard/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2002
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
Say hello to a relatable and rewarding early reader!
Fun with friends makes for a great day.
Norbit, a salmon-colored worm with a pink kerchief, joyfully greets the day and everyone he encounters. “Hello, friends! It’s time for fun with the sun! Let’s play!” He and his menagerie of forest pals—including the sun, who grows limbs and descends from the sky—exuberantly engage in various forms of physical activity such as jumping, going down a slide, spinning around, and watching the clouds go by. Young readers will readily relate, as these are games that most children are familiar with. As day turns to night, Norbit says farewell to Sun and welcomes Moon with an invitation to continue the fun. Watkins has created a vivid world of movement and merriment. Her illustrations feature bright bursts of color that match the energy of the text, with most sentences ending in an exclamation point. The author/illustrator incorporates many elements that make for an ideal early-reading experience (despite the use of a contraction or two): art free from clutter, text consisting of words with only one or two syllables, and repetition and recurring bits, such as a continued game of hide-and-seek with Sun. Inspired by never-before-seen sketches from the Dr. Seuss Collection archives at the University of California San Diego, this is the first title for Seuss Studios, a new imprint for original stories from “emerging authors and illustrators” who “honor Seuss’s hallmark spirit of creativity and imagination.”
Say hello to a relatable and rewarding early reader! (author's note) (Early reader. 5-8)Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780593646212
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Seuss Studios
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2024
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