A little brother gets a chance to be as teasing and bullyish as his big brother in this bit of purposeless wish-fulfillment. Gregory’s older brother Mark gets all the cool stuff—and he’s not above grinding Gregory’s face in it, literally. One evening at dinner, Gregory’s clueless parents urge him to eat up to be as big as Mark. But Gregory wants to be bigger and, lo, as he tears into his steak he morphs into a monstrous G-Rex—a T-Rex of the Gregory persuasion. He starts to intimidate and threaten his family: “MORE MEAT!” He roars. “Get more meat or I eat Mark!” So they frantically set about stuffing “G-Rex” with meat. When he is sated, he commences to bully Mark: over the TV; which beds will be slept in; who will shoot the basketball. When his family finally flees next door, G-Rex gets bored, has a little fit, and transforms back into Gregory. Even though he has broken Mark’s best basketball trophy during his tantrum, the boys work out their anger and proceed to have a great time at basketball. If retribution isn’t the answer, as seems to be suggested here, then what does inspire the boys to suddenly become chummy, a situation that feels utterly unconvincing because there are no previous referents? The story isn’t messy like life, it is just aimless, and Pearson’s artwork is too frail a scaffolding to give this shapeless narrative any structure. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-531-30243-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Orchard
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2000
This multigenerational snuggle will encourage the sharing of old memories and the creation of new ones.
Hill and Bobbiesi send a humungous hug from grandmothers to their granddaughters everywhere.
Delicate cartoon art adds details to the rhyming text showing multigenerational commonalities. “You and I are alike in such wonderful ways. / You will see more and more as you grow” (as grandmother and granddaughter enjoy the backyard together); “I wobbled uncertainly just as you did / whenever I tried something new” (as a toddler takes first steps); “And if a bad dream woke me up in the night, / I snuggled up with my lovey too” (grandmother kisses granddaughter, who clutches a plush narwhal). Grandmother-granddaughter pairs share everyday joys like eating ice cream, dancing “in the rain,” and making “up silly games.” Although some activities skew stereotypically feminine (baking, yoga), a grandmother helps with a quintessential volcano experiment (this pair presents black, adding valuable STEM representation), another cheers on a young wheelchair athlete (both present Asian), and a third, wearing a hijab, accompanies her brown-skinned granddaughter on a peace march, as it is “important to speak out for what you believe.” The message of unconditional love is clear throughout: “When you need me, I’ll be there to listen and care. / There is nothing that keeps us apart.” The finished book will include “stationery…for a special letter from Grandma to you!”
This multigenerational snuggle will encourage the sharing of old memories and the creation of new ones. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-7282-0623-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2020
A retro-futuristic romp, literally and figuratively screwy.
Robo-parents Diode and Lugnut present daughter Cathode with a new little brother—who requires, unfortunately, some assembly.
Arriving in pieces from some mechanistic version of Ikea, little Flange turns out to be a cute but complicated tyke who immediately falls apart…and then rockets uncontrollably about the room after an overconfident uncle tinkers with his basic design. As a squad of helpline techies and bevies of neighbors bearing sludge cake and like treats roll in, the cluttered and increasingly crowded scene deteriorates into madcap chaos—until at last Cath, with help from Roomba-like robodog Sprocket, stages an intervention by whisking the hapless new arrival off to a backyard workshop for a proper assembly and software update. “You’re such a good big sister!” warbles her frazzled mom. Wiesner’s robots display his characteristic clean lines and even hues but endearingly look like vaguely anthropomorphic piles of random jet-engine parts and old vacuum cleaners loosely connected by joints of armored cable. They roll hither and thither through neatly squared-off panels and pages in infectiously comical dismay. Even the end’s domestic tranquility lasts only until Cathode spots the little box buried in the bigger one’s packing material: “TWINS!” (This book was reviewed digitally with 9-by-22-inch double-page spreads viewed at 52% of actual size.)
A retro-futuristic romp, literally and figuratively screwy. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-544-98731-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: June 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2020
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