The very successful picture-book team of Joosse and Lavallee have previously explored mother love in Mama, Do You Love Me? (1991) and father love in Papa, Do You Love Me? (2005). They now visit grandmother love in this story of a Hawaiian grandmother and her granddaughter, Beautiful. Hawaiian words are sprinkled throughout the text with a glossary appended. (There’s also a string game with instructions in the back of the book.) The now-familiar formula makes for a sweet offering that some may find endearing but many will deem cloying and sticky. The similes seem forced: Beautiful has “breath as sweet as breadfruit pudding” and skin as “soft as kappa cloth.” And here Lavallee’s signature style—splitting her characters’ faces, with one-half light-skinned and the other dark—is somehow disturbing. Without the graceful symmetry of previous efforts, it’s as if half a face is attached to a profile, with an ultimately confusing result. Die-hard fans of this team may appreciate the offering, but most will find it redundant and/or disconcerting. (Picture book. 3-5)
Pub Date: March 26, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-8118-5815-1
Page Count: 36
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2008
Lola’s daddy takes her to the library every Saturday, where she finds “excellent books,” and every night her mommy or daddy reads them to her. The next day Lola acts out the story. On Sunday she’s a fairy princess; on Monday she takes her toy animals “on fantastic trips to places like Paris”; on Wednesday she’s a tiger, etc. Each new book and day provides Lola with a variety of tales to play out, with the last one—which is about a wild monster—posing the question, “What will Lola be tomorrow?” The final page shows her in a wolf suit just like Max’s. The library books, the pretending and the incorporation of the days of the week work together as a simple and pleasing premise. Beardshaw’s acrylic illustrations depict the multicultural kids and Lola’s black family with childlike charm, while the title will have librarians, parents and booksellers smiling. Alert: The book will be an invitation for lap kids to follow Lola’s lead—not such a bad thing. (Picture book. 3-5)
Pub Date: July 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-58089-258-2
Page Count: 28
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: June 3, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2010
Sweet.
A caregiving bear shares with its cub how love has defined their relationship from the first moment and through the years as the cub has grown.
With rhymes and a steady rhythm that are less singsong-y than similar books, Stansbie seems to have hit a sweet spot for this offering on the I-love-you-always shelf. Readers follow the adult and child as they share special moments together—a sunset, a splash in a pond, climbing a tree, a snuggle—and the adult tells the child that the love it feels has only grown. Stansbie also takes care not to put promises in the adult bear’s mouth that can’t be delivered, acknowledging that physical proximity is not always possible: “Wherever you are, / even when we’re apart… // I’ll love you forever / with all of my heart.” The large trim size helps the sweet illustrations shine; their emphasis is on the close relationship between parent and child. Shaped peekaboo windows offer glimpses of preceding and succeeding pages, images and text carefully placed to work whatever the context. While the die cuts on the interior pages will not hold up to rough handling, they do add whimsy and delight to the book as a whole: “And now that you’re bigger, / you make my heart sing. / My / beautiful / wonderful / magical / thing.” Those last three adjectives are positioned in leaf-shaped cutouts, the turn of the page revealing the roly-poly cub in a pile of leaves, three formed by the die-cuts. Opposite, three vignettes show the cub appreciating the “beautiful,” the “wonderful,” and the “magical.”
Sweet. (Picture book. 3-5)Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-68412-910-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Silver Dolphin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
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