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WRECK THIS APP

An app to energize the creative juices.

Essentially an interactive black-and-white coloring book filled with amusing tools to guide users in their pursuit to locate their inner artists.

"To create is to destroy," is the tagline for this text, which opens with basic instructions that encourage users to freely express themselves through a series of drawing exercises that are wide open to interpretation. For example, users are instructed to “scribble wildly, violently, with reckless abandon” or import pictures from their iPad for creative defacing. Each page features an array of tools at the bottom; these range from a simple pencil to a fingerpaint tool, which enables users to add color and special touches to each page. iPad functionality is well leveraged, though users will need to fight the urge to turn pages with a finger swipe, which only frustratingly draws lines across their drawing. Instead a patient finger-tap on the page’s bottom corners enables users to easily navigate. Users can save, e-mail or even utilize their Facebook or Flickr accounts to share their masterpieces. Due to some edgy page instructions ("Write as many four-letter words as you can"), this text is probably best suited for teens and adults.

An app to energize the creative juices. (iPad interactive sketchbook. 13 & up)

Pub Date: July 19, 2011

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Penguin

Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011

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THE BIG NOTHING

From the Neighborhood series , Vol. 3

Big brother Duane is off in boot camp, and Justin is left trying to hold the parental units together. Fat, acne-ridden, and missing his best friend Ben, who’s in the throes of his first boy-girl relationship with Cass, Justin’s world is dreary. It gets worse when he realizes that all of his mother’s suspicions about his father are probably true, and that Dad may not return from his latest business trip. Surprisingly ultra-cool Jemmie, who is also missing her best friend, Cass, actually recognizes his existence and her grandmother invites Justin to use their piano in the afternoons when Jemmie’s at cross-country practice. The “big nothing” place, where Justin retreats in time of trouble, is a rhythmic world and soon begins to include melody and provide Justin with a place to express himself. Practice and discipline accompany this gradual exploration of his talent. The impending war in Iraq gives this story a definite place in time, and its distinct characters make it satisfying and surprisingly realistic. Misfit finds fit. (Fiction. YA)

Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2004

ISBN: 1-56145-326-9

Page Count: 224

Publisher: Peachtree

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2004

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FUDGE-A-MANIA

A well-loved author brings together, on a Maine vacation, characters from two of her books. Peter's parents have assured him that though Sheila ("The Great") Tubman and her family will be nearby, they'll have their own house; but instead, they find a shared arrangement in which the two families become thoroughly intertwined—which suits everyone but the curmudgeonly Peter. Irrepressible little brother Fudge, now five, is planning to marry Sheila, who agrees to babysit with Peter's toddler sister; there's a romance between the grandparents in the two families; and the wholesome good fun, including a neighborhood baseball game featuring an aging celebrity player, seems more important than Sheila and Peter's halfhearted vendetta. The story's a bit tame (no controversies here), but often amusingly true to life and with enough comic episodes to satisfy fans.

Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1990

ISBN: 0-525-44672-9

Page Count: -

Publisher: Dutton

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2000

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