Attractive illustrations and the accompanying song help this app to rise above the ordinary.
This two-for-one app includes an evocative Northwoods animal fable plus a companion song.
When three animal friends each wish to take on some aspect of the others, their wish is granted—“just the thought alone made their wish come true.” Black Bear finds himself in a coat of Walleye’s shiny scales, Walleye sprouts Loon’s wings and Loon sports Black Bear’s luxurious coat. As you might expect, things don’t turn out as they had hoped. Bear looks very flashy in his coat of scales, but it doesn’t keep him warm; Loon’s black fur coat feels makes her feel queenly, but it weighs her down; and Walleye loves flying, but he keeps bumping into things. When the animals wish themselves back to their original states at the end of the day, they agree “to always appreciate each other’s gifts, but most of all to value their own.” The illustrations are quite lovely, and the panels can be manipulated for an interesting 3-D effect. The full-cast narration and the background sound effects are solid. The experience ends with the melodious “Waltz of the Northwoods,” which retells the story in song form. Navigation could be improved: There is no easy way to get to a specific page, and there is no pause option in the read-aloud mode to allow viewers time to play with the graphics.
Attractive illustrations and the accompanying song help this app to rise above the ordinary. (iPad storybook and song app. 4-8)Pub Date: Nov. 19, 2011
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Flying Word
Review Posted Online: Jan. 3, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2012
This bunny escapes all the traps but fails to find a logical plot or an emotional connection with readers.
The bestselling series (How to Catch an Elf, 2016, etc.) about capturing mythical creatures continues with a story about various ways to catch the Easter Bunny as it makes its annual deliveries.
The bunny narrates its own story in rhyming text, beginning with an introduction at its office in a manufacturing facility that creates Easter eggs and candy. The rabbit then abruptly takes off on its delivery route with a tiny basket of eggs strapped to its back, immediately encountering a trap with carrots and a box propped up with a stick. The narrative focuses on how the Easter Bunny avoids increasingly complex traps set up to catch him with no explanation as to who has set the traps or why. These traps include an underground tunnel, a fluorescent dance floor with a hidden pit of carrots, a robot bunny, pirates on an island, and a cannon that shoots candy fish, as well as some sort of locked, hazardous site with radiation danger. Readers of previous books in the series will understand the premise, but others will be confused by the rabbit’s frenetic escapades. Cartoon-style illustrations have a 1960s vibe, with a slightly scary, bow-tied bunny with chartreuse eyes and a glowing palette of neon shades that shout for attention.
This bunny escapes all the traps but fails to find a logical plot or an emotional connection with readers. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4926-3817-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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