A visual feast teeming with life.
A young urbanite romps through floral fields and deep into a flower’s anatomy, exploring humanity’s connection to nature.
A solo car travels away from the dense, gray cityscape. Mountains rise up, full of pattern and light, before revealing a fluorescent field of flowers. A child bursts from the car across the page, neon-rainbow hair streaming in the wind, as both child and place radiate joy and life. The brown-skinned, blue-eyed youngster breathes in the meadow and begins an adventure—part Jamberry, part “Thumbelina,” and part existential journey as the child realizes the life force running through the veins of the flower is the same that runs through all of us, from the water that sustains to the sun that grows. Harris’ colored-pencil illustrations are full of energy and spontaneity. His use of patterning and graphic symbology evoke Oaxacan design, yet the style is all his own. The text is equally enthusiastic: “Have you ever seen / a flower so deep / you had to shout / HELLO / and listen for an echo / just to know / how deep it goes?” The text shifts abruptly from metaphor to metaphor, in one spread the flower likened to a palace and a few pages later, to human anatomy. Nevertheless, like the protagonist and the natural environment, readers will feel themselves stretch and bloom.
A visual feast teeming with life. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4521-8270-4
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
A successful swap from coconut tree to Christmas tree.
A Christmas edition of the beloved alphabet book.
The story starts off nearly identically to Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (1989), written by John Archambault and the late Bill Martin Jr, with the letters A, B, and C deciding to meet in the branches of a tree. This time, they’re attempting to scale a Christmas tree, not a coconut tree, and the letters are strung together like garland. A, B, and C are joined by the other letters, and of course they all “slip, slop, topple, plop!” right down the tree. At the bottom, they discover an assortment of gifts, all in a variety of shapes. As a team, the letters and presents organize themselves to get back up on the Christmas tree and get a star to the top. Holiday iterations of favorite tales often fall flat, but this take succeeds. The gifts are an easy way to reinforce another preschool concept—shapes—and the text uses just enough of the original to be familiar. The rhyming works, sticking to the cadence of the source material. The illustrations pay homage to the late Lois Ehlert’s, featuring the same bold block letters, though they lack some of the whimsy and personality of the original. Otherwise, everything is similarly brightly colored and simply drawn. Those familiar with the classic will be drawn to this one, but newcomers can enjoy it on its own.
A successful swap from coconut tree to Christmas tree. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2024
ISBN: 9781665954761
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
A comical, fresh look at crayons and color.
Duncan wants to draw, but instead of crayons, he finds a stack of letters listing the crayons’ demands in this humorous tale.
Red is overworked, laboring even on holidays. Gray is exhausted from coloring expansive spaces (elephants, rhinos and whales). Black wants to be considered a color-in color, and Peach? He’s naked without his wrapper! This anthropomorphized lot amicably requests workplace changes in hand-lettered writing, explaining their work stoppage to a surprised Duncan. Some are tired, others underutilized, while a few want official titles. With a little creativity and a lot of color, Duncan saves the day. Jeffers delivers energetic and playful illustrations, done in pencil, paint and crayon. The drawings are loose and lively, and with few lines, he makes his characters effectively emote. Clever spreads, such as Duncan’s “white cat in the snow” perfectly capture the crayons’ conundrum, and photographic representations of both the letters and coloring pages offer another layer of texture, lending to the tale’s overall believability.
A comical, fresh look at crayons and color. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: June 27, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-399-25537-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: April 14, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2013
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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