A silly, skillful, and scientifically grounded tale.
One henhouse resident gets back to her roots.
Fiercely protective of her fellow fowl, Lena is one tough chicken. When the people who run the farm try to extract eggs from the coop, Lena henpecks them mercilessly. And when the hens are spooked by harmless things like boxes and frogs, Lena demands that they buck up. Unlike the other chickens, Lena understands something significant about her true nature. She’s a dinosaur, capable of terrifying intruders and protecting her kin. Her talents are brought to bear when a weasel sneaks into their pen one night. Lena’s primeval squawk sends the interloper scrambling, minus most of his whiskers. Finally, Lena’s skeptics, avian and human alike, appreciate her particular gift. An excellent opportunity for a dramatic read-aloud, the narration is paced in a fablelike style with sprinkles of jokey speech-bubble dialogue and a few scientific facts thrown in for good measure—chickens are indeed among the closest living relatives to theropods. Steele’s illustrations are a delightful match for Bailey’s story. Relying on loose, sketchy pencil drawings and splashes of watercolor that emphasize the narrative’s beats, she depicts overreactive hens huddled at the dinner table, a desultory weasel at his boudoir mirror, and a puzzled human family bandaging their chicken-caused injuries. Lena’s owners are tan-skinned and dark-haired.
A silly, skillful, and scientifically grounded tale. (information on dinosaurs) (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781774880135
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Tundra Books
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story.
A home-renovation project is interrupted by a family of wrens, allowing a young girl an up-close glimpse of nature.
Renata and her father enjoy working on upgrading their bathroom, installing a clawfoot bathtub, and cutting a space for a new window. One warm night, after Papi leaves the window space open, two wrens begin making a nest in the bathroom. Rather than seeing it as an unfortunate delay of their project, Renata and Papi decide to let the avian carpenters continue their work. Renata witnesses the birth of four chicks as their rosy eggs split open “like coats that are suddenly too small.” Renata finds at a crucial moment that she can help the chicks learn to fly, even with the bittersweet knowledge that it will only hasten their exits from her life. Rosen uses lively language and well-chosen details to move the story of the baby birds forward. The text suggests the strong bond built by this Afro-Latinx father and daughter with their ongoing project without needing to point it out explicitly, a light touch in a picture book full of delicate, well-drawn moments and precise wording. Garoche’s drawings are impressively detailed, from the nest’s many small bits to the developing first feathers on the chicks and the wall smudges and exposed wiring of the renovation. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-20-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Renata’s wren encounter proves magical, one most children could only wish to experience outside of this lovely story. (Picture book. 3-7)Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-12320-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
Serve this superbly designed title to all who relish slightly scary stories.
Kids know vegetables can be scary, but rarely are edible roots out to get someone. In this whimsical mock-horror tale, carrots nearly frighten the whiskers off Jasper Rabbit, an interloper at Crackenhopper Field.
Jasper loves carrots, especially those “free for the taking.” He pulls some in the morning, yanks out a few in the afternoon, and comes again at night to rip out more. Reynolds builds delicious suspense with succinct language that allows understatements to be fully exploited in Brown’s hilarious illustrations. The cartoon pictures, executed in pencil and then digitally colored, are in various shades of gray and serve as a perfectly gloomy backdrop for the vegetables’ eerie orange on each page. “Jasper couldn’t get enough carrots … / … until they started following him.” The plot intensifies as Jasper not only begins to hear the veggies nearby, but also begins to see them everywhere. Initially, young readers will wonder if this is all a product of Jasper’s imagination. Was it a few snarling carrots or just some bathing items peeking out from behind the shower curtain? The ending truly satisfies both readers and the book’s characters alike. And a lesson on greed goes down like honey instead of a forkful of spinach.
Serve this superbly designed title to all who relish slightly scary stories. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Aug. 21, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4424-0297-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2012
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