A wild ride with a wonderfully weird cast of creatures.
A boy encounters curious creatures on a strange galactic journey.
Cosmo is ready to test a jet pack prototype, but things go haywire as soon as it’s activated. Thrust deep into swirling space, he’s found by a purple creature who looks distinctly like an upside-down light bulb and who turns out to be most hospitable, offering Cosmo nachos and a place to rest. Soon, a careless push of a button sends Cosmo hurtling headlong into a lush jungle, where he discovers a wiggly white bloblike creature in search of its family. The pair proceed to a bustling city, where they narrowly evade a great green sewer monster and meet a bald, bearded, pink-skinned magician who vows to send them homeward. His specious spell simply flips them topsy-turvy, and the story literally turns upside down as well. Youngsters must then flip the book over, reading from back to front and viewing the peculiar planetary passage in a new light—the seemingly bald magician grows a full head of hair, frowns become smiles, and a sinister skull cracker replaces the harmless nachos—but all is made right in the end. De Castro’s creative concept is impressively executed; each image must work turned on its head, and it does. Moreover, Cosmo’s interstellar odyssey is so fun and fully realized that readers will intuitively understand what’s going on, making it a page-turner, twice over. In de Castro’s squared-off, thick-lined cartoon artwork, Cosmo is light-skinned and wears a spacesuit throughout.
A wild ride with a wonderfully weird cast of creatures. (Graphic science fiction. 5-9)Pub Date: Dec. 2, 2025
ISBN: 9781838743550
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Flying Eye Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: today
What a wag.
What do you get from sewing the head of a smart dog onto the body of a tough police officer? A new superhero from the incorrigible creator of Captain Underpants.
Finding a stack of old Dog Mancomics that got them in trouble back in first grade, George and Harold decide to craft a set of new(ish) adventures with (more or less) improved art and spelling. These begin with an origin tale (“A Hero Is Unleashed”), go on to a fiendish attempt to replace the chief of police with a “Robo Chief” and then a temporarily successful scheme to make everyone stupid by erasing all the words from every book (“Book ’Em, Dog Man”), and finish off with a sort of attempted alien invasion evocatively titled “Weenie Wars: The Franks Awaken.” In each, Dog Man squares off against baddies (including superinventor/archnemesis Petey the cat) and saves the day with a clever notion. With occasional pauses for Flip-O-Rama featurettes, the tales are all framed in brightly colored sequential panels with hand-lettered dialogue (“How do you feel, old friend?” “Ruff!”) and narrative. The figures are studiously diverse, with police officers of both genders on view and George, the chief, and several other members of the supporting cast colored in various shades of brown. Pilkey closes as customary with drawing exercises, plus a promise that the canine crusader will be further unleashed in a sequel.
What a wag. (Graphic fantasy. 7-9)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-58160-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Graphix/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Two delightfully dense heroes bring folk tales into the 21st century, and young readers are all the richer for it.
Two thickheaded macaroni noodles prove the old adage: a fool and his firewood are soon parted.
Fools have been called “noodleheads” for centuries, but until recently few have represented the term quite so literally. Mac and Mac aren’t the brightest pieces of pasta in the world, but their hearts are in the right place. Here, the two decide to help their mama out by gathering firewood in hopes that she’ll bake them a cake. As they are attempting to cut the very branch they’re sitting on, a passing meatball points out that they are mere minutes away from bruised bottoms. When his words come to pass, our heroes decide the meatball is clairvoyant and demand to know their future. Drawing on and smoothly weaving together a variety of folk tales, the brief graphic novel describes how its obtuse protagonists single-mindedly seek cake, even as they anticipate death, purchase “firewood seeds” (aka acorns), and accidentally dig their mother a garden. Emergent readers will appreciate the simple text, short chapters, and comics-inspired paneled illustrations. Adults will appreciate the authors’ note, which goes into some detail about each chapter’s folk origins.
Two delightfully dense heroes bring folk tales into the 21st century, and young readers are all the richer for it. (Graphic early reader. 5-9)Pub Date: March 15, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-8234-3673-6
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 20, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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