One lone, yellow dot sits in the center of a blank, white page. Underneath is the inviting command (affirming the reader's already intrinsic urge): "Press here." Turn the page; now there are two yellow dots! Press again. Now, three! What happens if you tap them? Or tilt the book on its side? Gleefully, the dots scatter like marbles. Readers will clamor to press, poke, shake and blow the pages to find out what happens next. Compared to the squawking sounds and flashing lights of many toys, Tullet's simplicity is a breath of fresh air. He cues page turns with complete mastery of his audience. When all the dots very nearly float off the top of the page (readers may have blown too hard in the previous spread), he suggests what they will already have intuited: "Stand the book up straight / to make those dots drop down again." Clapping once makes the dots grow bigger; "Whoa! Clap twice?" A frenzy of clapping brings readers round to the beginning again. Better read one-on-one to avoid the crush of excited participants; however, all audiences will smile at this visual jolt of imaginative play. Children and parents keen to explore technological interactivity will delight in recalling the infinite possibilities of the picture book. (Picture book. 3-8)
Pub Date: March 16, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-8118-7954-5
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Handprint/Chronicle
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2011
A bit predictable but pleasantly illustrated.
Bill Martin Jr and John Archambault’s classic alphabet book Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (1989) gets the Halloween treatment.
Chung follows the original formula to the letter. In alphabetical order, each letter climbs to the top of a tree. They are knocked back to the ground in a jumble before climbing up in sequence again. In homage to the spooky holiday theme, they scale a “creaky old tree,” and a ghostly jump scare causes the pileup. The chunky, colorful art is instantly recognizable. The charmingly costumed letters (“H swings a tail. / I wears a patch. J and K don / bows that don’t match”) are set against a dark backdrop, framed by pages with orange or purple borders. The spreads feature spiderwebs and jack-o’-lanterns. The familiar rhyme cadence is marred by the occasional clunky or awkward phrase; in particular, the adapted refrain of “Chicka chicka tricka treat” offers tongue-twisting fun, but it’s repeatedly followed by the disappointing half-rhyme “Everybody sneaka sneak.” Even this odd construction feels shoehorned into place, since “sneaking” makes little sense when every character in the book is climbing together. The final line of the book ends on a more satisfying note, with “Everybody—time to eat!”
A bit predictable but pleasantly illustrated. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: July 15, 2025
ISBN: 9781665954785
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: March 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2025
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
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