The coarsely stitched fabric collages illustrating these 13 retold fables aren’t all that’s patchy about Lynch’s picture-book debut. He writes with an informality that can be engaging: “ ‘Hold on there,’ said the Tortoise. ‘I’ll bet if we had a race I would win!’ ‘You’ve got to be kidding!’ laughed the Hare. ‘Okay, slowpoke, let’s go!’ ” Unfortunately, the informal writing is sometimes just amateurish—Aesop “was freed by his masters on account of his intelligence”—and it mixes in too-sketchy renditions of several lesser-known fables. Readers will scratch their heads over Zeus’s seemingly unprovoked condemnation of Snake in “The Unwelcome Guest,” or the story of a fox who grows too fat to escape after gobbling a shepherd’s lunch. Oddly, this is billed as a lesson in patience rather than greed. Confusing, too, is the awkwardly worded final moral: “A false appearance, no matter how believable, is no match for the real thing.” At its best, the art shows a fresh, lively sense of color and design, but that too varies. Clumsy work next to the likes of Sogabe’s elegant Aesop’s Fox (1999) or Cuyler’s Roadsigns: A Harey Race with a Tortoise (p. 957). (Picture book/folktale. 7-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-670-88948-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
Go adventuring with a better guide.
Find something to do in every state in the U.S.A.!
This guide highlights a location of interest within each of the states, therefore excluding Washington, D.C., and the territories. Trivia about each location is scattered across crisply rendered landscapes that background each state’s double-page spread while diminutive, diverse characters populate the scenes. Befitting the title, one “adventure” is presented per state, such as shrimping in Louisiana’s bayous, snowshoeing in Connecticut, or celebrating the Fourth of July in Boston. While some are stereotypical gimmes (surfing in California), others have the virtue of novelty, at least for this audience, such as viewing the sandhill crane migration in Nebraska. Within this thematic unity, some details go astray, and readers may find themselves searching in vain for animals mentioned. The trivia is plentiful but may be misleading, vague, or incorrect. Information about the Native American peoples of the area is often included, but its brevity—especially regarding sacred locations—means readers are floundering without sufficient context. The same is true for many of the facts that relate directly to expansion and colonialism, such as the unexplained near extinction of bison. Describing the genealogical oral history of South Carolina’s Gullah community as “spin[ning] tales” is equally brusque and offensive. The book tries to do a lot, but it is more style than substance, which may leave readers bored, confused, slightly annoyed—or all three. (This book was reviewed digitally with 12.2-by-20.2-inch double-page spreads viewed at 80% of actual size.)
Go adventuring with a better guide. (tips on local adventuring, index) (Nonfiction. 8-10)Pub Date: Oct. 6, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-7112-5445-9
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Wide Eyed Editions
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
Mama God, Papa God ($15.95; Apr. 26; 32 pp.; 1-56656-307-0): The creation story takes a whimsical Caribbean turn in a seamless blend of religion and folk-art set in Haiti. Tired of living in darkness, Papa God creates light, then goes on to make the world as a beautiful gift for Mama God. Together, they design a detailed world filled with brilliance, love, and humor. Highly stylized illustrations rich in primary colors show the progress of creation as animals, birds, water, fish, wind, and rain take their place in the world. This unusual rendition of the creation tale sings to a calypso beat and gives a strikingly different and exuberant interpretation of how the world began. (Picture book. 3-8)
Pub Date: April 26, 1999
ISBN: 1-56656-307-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Interlink
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1999
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