A fox, a moth, an owl, a mouse, and a frog—night creatures all—fight with each other over their definitions of the moon. The fox says it’s “a rabbit, swift and large and glowing;” the moth that it’s a big cocoon “where moths of legend are born;” the owl that it’s “a window in a midnight room;” the mouse that it’s “a seed in endless bloom;” and the frog that it’s “a lily pad for froggy croons.” To settle their quarrel, they visit the Man of Science, who lives “alone with his thoughts in a tower high enough to almost touch the moon.” The Man of Science reads to them from a “squarish book,” but the animals do not find the moon in its inky pages, and return sadly home, each holding to his or her own definition. The fox speaks for all of them when he says, “The Man says it’s made of letters—I know it’s more the spaces in between.” The concepts and vocabulary in this sometimes disconcertingly rhyming text are overly abstract, complex, and metaphorical for the audience of three- to seven-year-olds for whom the book and its illustrations are targeted, although there may somewhere be a five-year-old with a philosophical bent to whom the book will appeal. The illustrations, too, convey mixed messages with their combination of bold and sophisticated colors and patterns and their comically caricatured animals. The white words on black backgrounds are placed to the far left or right of each opening, leaving no room for them to be spaced in lines that reflect their rhythmic patterns. Well-intentioned text—but it misses its mark. (Picture book. 3-7)
Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-399-23425-X
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2001
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.
A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.
Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
Hee haw.
The print version of a knee-slapping cumulative ditty.
In the song, Smith meets a donkey on the road. It is three-legged, and so a “wonky donkey” that, on further examination, has but one eye and so is a “winky wonky donkey” with a taste for country music and therefore a “honky-tonky winky wonky donkey,” and so on to a final characterization as a “spunky hanky-panky cranky stinky-dinky lanky honky-tonky winky wonky donkey.” A free musical recording (of this version, anyway—the author’s website hints at an adults-only version of the song) is available from the publisher and elsewhere online. Even though the book has no included soundtrack, the sly, high-spirited, eye patch–sporting donkey that grins, winks, farts, and clumps its way through the song on a prosthetic metal hoof in Cowley’s informal watercolors supplies comical visual flourishes for the silly wordplay. Look for ready guffaws from young audiences, whether read or sung, though those attuned to disability stereotypes may find themselves wincing instead or as well.
Hee haw. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-545-26124-1
Page Count: 26
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2018
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