Phineas, good-humored and insightful in his believable first-person voice, once again provides a pertinent, easy-to-read...
Fourth-grade scientist Phineas L. MacGuire is back for another outing, exploring science ideas in the world around him and figuring out a way to deal with the class bully.
He’s supported by his friends, fellow scientist Aretha, who’s working on a Girl Scout cooking badge, and polar-opposite Ben, who seems to live largely for bacon (even in brownies). Tasked with cooking his family’s supper for the foreseeable future, Phineas comes to understand—and to explain to readers—some of the scientific principles of cooking, including how yeast and baking soda make foods rise. What he’s less able to make sense of is why class bully Evan has suddenly focused on him, strong-arming him into cooking brownies for him almost every day—or else. With few viable options, Phineas does what any good scientist would; he attempts to study Evan’s behavior—with unexpected results that offer both insight and a resource for kids dealing with their own bullies. Unlike previous Phineas stories, this one lacks science experiments, but with new information about how some aspects of cooking work, readers could develop their own. McDaniels’ softly shaded illustrations are attractive and numerous, but they don’t always quite match with descriptions in the text.
Phineas, good-humored and insightful in his believable first-person voice, once again provides a pertinent, easy-to-read tale for grade schoolers. (Fiction. 7-11)Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4814-0099-2
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: Sept. 2, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists.
How to raise money for a coveted poster: put your friends to work!
John, founder of the FUBU fashion line and a Shark Tank venture capitalist, offers a self-referential blueprint for financial success. Having only half of the $10 he needs for a Minka J poster, Daymond forks over $1 to buy a plain T-shirt, paints a picture of the pop star on it, sells it for $5, and uses all of his cash to buy nine more shirts. Then he recruits three friends to decorate them with his design and help sell them for an unspecified amount (from a conveniently free and empty street-fair booth) until they’re gone. The enterprising entrepreneur reimburses himself for the shirts and splits the remaining proceeds, which leaves him with enough for that poster as well as a “brand-new business book,” while his friends express other fiscal strategies: saving their share, spending it all on new art supplies, or donating part and buying a (math) book with the rest. (In a closing summation, the author also suggests investing in stocks, bonds, or cryptocurrency.) Though Miles cranks up the visual energy in her sparsely detailed illustrations by incorporating bright colors and lots of greenbacks, the actual advice feels a bit vague. Daymond is Black; most of the cast are people of color. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
It’s hard to argue with success, but guides that actually do the math will be more useful to budding capitalists. (Picture book. 7-9)Pub Date: March 21, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-56727-2
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2023
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
SEEN & HEARD
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